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Chapter Text

Crouching on the living room floor next to Steve, Danny holds his gun with one hand and gestures at Steve's arm with the other. "What the hell?"

"I got shot, Danny," Steve says, fashioning his torn shirt into a bandage to stem the bleeding. That fucker Nick Taylor had fired while Steve was on the phone with him, grazing Steve's right arm just below the intricate tattoo. So far, so familiar; Danny had received a practically identical wound on their first day of working together.

But Danny's bullet graze hadn't given off acrid black fumes. He's pretty sure he would have remembered that.

"I'm aware you got shot; I saw you get shot, which is all too common an experience for me these days. No, I'm talking about the weird-smelling smoke coming from your arm right now."

Steve is acting calm enough, movements methodical as he gets the Molotov cocktails ready, but his eyes are wild and he's broadcasting 'don't fuck with me' vibes. The bleeding cut on his forehead makes him look even more savage.

"Can we deal with this later, Danny? Because in case you hadn't noticed, my house is still under siege from highly-trained men who want us dead."

"We will definitely revisit this topic, Steve; count on it." Danny shakes his head slightly in the hope of clearing it. "Okay, so Kono and Chin are covering the upstairs and we're on firebomb duty. What's next?"

Steve grins, crazed and dangerous and beautiful, as he outlines the plan. Then they launch their counter-attack.

In the end, it comes down to Steve and his former friend on the beach, fighting with knives. Danny watches from inside the now-secured house, using a pair of night vision binoculars he'd taken off one of the dead guys. Danny's too far away to get a clear shot at Taylor, and he can't risk distracting Steve by getting any closer. So he waits, and prays.

The two of them are moving so fast that Danny can't quite follow what's going on. It feels like watching a really good fight scene in an action movie, except that it's Danny's partner out there and they're not using plastic knives that retract on impact.

There is something strange about Taylor's weapon, though. It's a dark night, but the gleaming blade is visible to Danny even without the binoculars; Steve's steel knife doesn't have the same shine to it. Taylor's blade looks like it's made of silver, and why the fuck would he be carrying something like that?

Danny winces as that shining knife slices across Steve's left arm, and Steve ends up on the sand...oh God, things are looking bad for him. But somehow Steve gets the better of Taylor, and shoots the bastard dead. Danny sends silent thanks heavenward, and leaves the house at a run.

Down on the beach he finds Steve ready to collapse, tears in his eyes and blood streaming from a gash on his bicep. Danny can't see if there's smoke coming off the wound, but the tang of the ocean breeze can't disguise that same nasty burning smell as before.

And then HPD are all around them, too late to be much help, and paramedics escort Steve away. Danny stays, along with Chin and Kono, to oversee the handover of General Pak and his family and to update the relevant authorities on what's happened. By the time he leaves, well after midnight, CSU's already examining the scene and all the scattered bodies.

Christ, Danny thinks as he drives home, how many more people are going to die at the McGarrett house? He doesn't think Steve's the devout type; still, it wouldn't hurt to get some kind of priest in there to cleanse the air.

***

It's late the next morning before Danny sees Steve again. He could have easily slept all day, catching up after the stress of the General Pak case; it's a Saturday, and he doesn't have Grace this weekend. But he's worried about Steve, who was not only wounded last night but also betrayed by someone he'd once trusted with his life.

Sometimes it's difficult for Danny to gauge the level of concern and affection for Steve that he can safely show. Danny wants so much from him, wants to give him so much, that it takes effort to keep himself within acceptable parameters.

Steve's his teammate and friend, so Danny figures that gives him the right to stop by and check how he's doing. That's what he would've done if something similar had happened to Marco, his partner back in Jersey. But Danny never pictured Marco while jerking off.

He has another reason for visiting Steve this morning, though. No matter how he feels about the guy, Danny's a detective first and foremost. And he can't turn off that instinct which leads him to notice, remember, and seek explanations for unusual occurrences.

Thinking about those weird injuries had kept Danny awake last night, long after exhaustion should have claimed him. So he's formulated a mental list of questions for Steve (first up: 'Seriously, what the hell?').

He forgets them all once he gets to Steve's place, lets himself in, and sees the devastation in daylight.

The house is in a bad enough state, but Steve himself looks terrible. He's lying on the couch under a blanket, eyes open but unfocused. It looks like he slept here – if he got any sleep at all, which seems unlikely from the dark circles under his eyes. His tanned skin is gray, his lips bluish, and he's sweating despite the cool breeze coming in through the broken windows.

Danny sinks to his knees beside the couch, his parental side taking over. He reaches out to feel Steve's forehead, avoiding that cut above his right eye even though it's nearly healed already.

Steve's burning up, skin clammy; when Danny feels for his pulse, he finds it's racing. The scariest thing is how Steve's just lying there, in his bullet-riddled childhood home, letting Danny touch his face and throat without threatening to break his fingers. He's never seen Steve so listless.

"What's wrong with you? You should be in the hospital," Danny says. "Come on, get up, I'll drive you over there right now."

Steve looks at him with bloodshot, shadowed eyes and scoffs weakly. "Forget it. They wouldn't know what to do with this."

"What the fuck are you talking about? You've obviously got some nasty infection from Taylor's knife. Either he forgot all the rules about keeping weapons clean, or he deliberately coated the blade with something toxic just to mess you up."

Steve shakes his head, but doesn't offer an alternative explanation.

"Let me see what that bastard did to you," Danny orders. Steve hesitates for a long moment before relaxing his death grip on the blanket, and Danny pulls it back to expose his bare torso. He doesn't stare at Steve's chest, or glance down at the black boxer-briefs that hide very little. Danny's not a creep; he wouldn't take advantage of a mostly-naked sick friend like that, even if said friend is ridiculously attractive.

The paramedics had bandaged both Steve's arms, but the gauze dressings are now stained dark with blood. Danny pulls out the pocketknife he's started carrying at all times – 'always be prepared' is a damn good motto when Steve McGarrett's your partner – and carefully cuts the bandages off.

He can't help sucking in a breath at what he sees. Danny knows from experience what a bullet graze and a knife gash should look like the next day, and this isn't it. Although blood is still seeping out, it appears that the damaged flesh has mostly knitted itself back together. Even with the help of stitches, Steve has healed remarkably fast.

But the skin around both wounds is blistered and blackened, as though it's been burned, and that strange bitter smell still lingers.

"Steve," Danny says urgently, "something's seriously wrong here. You need help, babe."

"No!" Despite Steve's fragile state his voice is loud, and so vehement that Danny involuntarily takes his hands off Steve and sits back on his heels.

Steve bites his lip and then goes on, calmer but still insistent. "I'm telling you, Danny, I know what this is. And there's no cure but time. I just have to sweat it out, and sleep it off."

"Okay, so, what is 'this' and what's causing it?"

"Silver," Steve says quietly.

Danny blinks at him. "Wait, silver is bad for you? I saw some late-night thing about it boosting your immune system. The way the infomercial hosts were talking, it's a magic bullet."

Steve's laugh has a strained edge to it. "Yeah, you could say that."

"So explain the problem to me, then," Danny demands.

"Nick used a silver bullet to shoot me, and a silver knife to stab me."

Huh. Well, Danny had seen that odd gleaming blade of Taylor's for himself. And CSU had called him this morning, reporting that one of the bullets they'd found embedded in the living room wall had been different: shinier than the rest, and definitely not made of the usual materials. They were sending it for analysis, although results wouldn't be back until Monday at the earliest – the lab was short-staffed at the weekend.

Five-0 usually got priority lab access, but Danny hadn't insisted in this case. It had hardly seemed time-critical, since all the bad guys were dead and General Pak's plane was already in the air.

"Okay, I believe you," Danny eventually says. "But why would he do that?"

Steve shrugs, but Danny can tell he's faking ignorance. "So you're allergic to silver and Taylor knew?" he presses. "Or, what, did he think you're a werewolf or something?"

Most people wouldn't catch the way Steve momentarily flinches, before his expression goes blank. But Danny's able to read his partner pretty well by now.

He knows he just struck a nerve; he also knows that Steve's verging on a total shutdown. Danny won't get anything else out of Steve today. And the harder he pushes, the less likely it is that Steve will ever open up to him.

"I told you, man, you gotta choose your friends more carefully," Danny says, with a lightness he doesn't feel. "Ol' Bullfrog must have been bugfuck crazy, to mistake your silver allergy for a sign of lycanthropy."

'Yeah, I guess," Steve says, then looks at Danny with surprise. "Wait, how come you know that term?"

"Lycanthropy? It turned up in the 'word of the day' desk calendar Grace gave me last Christmas," Danny explains. "What, you hadn't noticed my ever-expanding vocabulary?"

"You do use an awful lot of words," Steve says, smiling slightly. Though he's clearly still in pain, the tension in his body seems to have reduced.

It's a start, Danny thinks.

"Okay," he says briskly, "have you showered since last night?" Steve shakes his head. "How about you go take one now? It'll make you feel better, and these wounds need cleaning before I can re-bandage them."

"I'm not sure I can manage the stairs," Steve admits, and that's more weakness than he's ever allowed himself to reveal in their months of working together. Danny feels stupidly flattered.

"No problem – I'll help you. I'm stronger than I look, you know."

"I know exactly how strong you are," Steve says. Danny doesn't know how to take that, so he just stands up, reaches for Steve's hands, and pulls him off the couch. Steve sways on his feet, and Danny wonders if it's from exhaustion, hunger, or this supposed allergic reaction. He'll try to get Steve to eat something before putting him to bed.

Going slowly, Steve's right arm slung across Danny's shoulders, they make it across the living room and up the stairs. Danny loses count of the bullet holes he sees in the walls en route. Jesus, it's going to take a lot of work to get this place back in shape. At least someone cleaned up the broken glass last night, so Steve's bare feet won't get cut to ribbons.

They make it to the bathroom, and Danny parks Steve on the side of the tub as he runs the shower. He's not at all surprised to find that Steve's soap is the non-perfumed, anti-bacterial kind – that should help.

"You probably shouldn't wash your hair for a few days," Danny suggests. "It'll just pull at your stitches. I speak from bitter personal experience, trust me."

"I do," Steve says, meeting Danny's eyes. Danny glances away, discomfited by that earnest look.

"Can you take it from here?"

Steve nods.

"Try not to fall over," Danny says, and closes the door behind him. He could go downstairs, maybe find something to read, but he needs the time to think – and he wants to be nearby in case Steve needs help. So he sinks to the floor outside the bathroom, and rests his head against the wall.

He can believe that having an allergy to silver is a real medical problem; people seem to be allergic to every last thing, these days. He can also believe that Nick Taylor came back from Afghanistan less than sane. Danny had gotten a bad feeling about the ex-SEAL from the start, and the way he'd deceived, taunted, and then tried to kill his old commanding officer was pretty damn psychotic.

Taylor could have observed Steve's reaction to silver, at some point, and developed some fucked-up theory about the reason for it. So: 2 + 2 = 4, right? The guy was a delusional shithead, and poor Steve is now suffering the consequences.

And anyway...even if werewolves are real, Steve can't be one. Danny pulled an all-night stakeout with him, just a few weeks ago. It was a beautiful night, with no clouds to hide the full moon. He clearly remembers spending the long hours swapping stories with a human being, not a howling monster.

End of story.

Except – no. All Danny's instincts are telling him that there's more to it. He's certain of two things: that his partner is hiding something important from him, and that hearing the word 'werewolf' had made Steve flinch for some reason.

Danny's pretty sure about a few other things, too. Steve's healing quickly, abnormally so, but his skin still looks weirdly charred. Danny's sister used to get allergic contact dermatitis as a teenager, until she figured out which cosmetics preservative caused the problem. She'd complain that her skin felt like it was on fire, yeah, but there was definitely no burning or smoke involved.

He's handled enough arson cases to recognize the stench of seared flesh; he's seen the dead in every state of degradation and decay, and probably knows all the odors a living human can produce. The smell coming off Steve's wounds is different – sharper, somehow.

Danny cannot come up with an explanation for all of this that makes a lick of sense.

***

The water shuts off in the bathroom, and Steve opens the door a few minutes later with a towel wrapped around his waist. He looks slightly better, although still dangerously pale all over, and blood is trickling from his knife wound.

"Time to patch you up again, and then you need more sleep," Danny says, getting to his feet. "Where's your first aid kit?"

Steve rubs his eyes, looking for a moment like a tired little boy. "Kitchen – under the sink."

"Okay, I'll go grab it. Head to your room, and put on whatever you usually sleep in."

Steve just nods silently and walks down the hall, leaning on the wall for support. God, it's freaking Danny out to see him be so obedient.

Danny goes down to the kitchen to get the supplies. While he's there, he grabs a bottle of water out of the fridge since Steve is no doubt seriously dehydrated. He also takes a few moments to fix the snacks Gracie always requested when she was sick: peanut butter on crackers, and peeled carrots cut into sticks.

And yeah, maybe it's weird that Danny's thinking about Steve the way a parent would. But he needs someone to take care of him, and there's nobody else left to do it.

Danny goes back upstairs to find Steve lying on the unmade bed, wearing only pajama pants. His eyes are closed, but he doesn't exactly look peaceful; he's sweating and shivering.

Steve opens his eyes as Danny enters the room. Despite being so out of it, the sharp senses that have kept him alive thus far are still working. Danny sits on the edge of the bed and pulls on a pair of latex gloves from the med kit.

"Do you need any special topical stuff to treat the allergic reaction?" Steve had said he recognized the symptoms, which probably means this – whatever this might be – has happened before.

"Plain antibiotic cream is fine," Steve says.

Danny cleans the wounds out, dries them, dabs the ointment on, and applies new dressings. The whole process must hurt like hell, but Steve grits his teeth, clenches his fists, and barely utters a sound.

"Thanks," he says when Danny's done. "You're good at that."

"I've been on so many first aid courses that I could probably teach one by now," Danny jokes, peeling off the gloves. "Plus, I'm a father – I've patched up plenty of boo-boos in my time." He always kisses them better, too, though he doesn't mention that to Steve.

"So, you think you could eat something or are you too nauseous?"

"I am hungry, yeah," Steve says, sitting up gingerly. Danny reaches over to prop the pillows against the brass headboard, then lays the plate of snacks on Steve's lap.

Steve picks up a cracker liberally covered with peanut butter, and smiles a little. "My mom used to fix me these when I had to stay home from school."

"Yeah, mine too. It's a universal panacea, I guess, like chicken soup."

Steve's stomach rumbles, and Danny grins. "Oh, is that a vote for chicken soup I hear? 'Cos that could be arranged. My great-grandma's recipe is a family secret that I am forbidden from ever writing down. Seriously: when Grace is old enough, I have to teach her in person 'til she knows it by heart. But since I'm in a charitable mood and you're so sick, I'm willing to make it for you tonight."

"That sounds amazing. Honestly, though, I'll be fine. You don't have to stay and look after me," Steve says, not meeting Danny's gaze.

"Yes, I do – you're my partner. If you won't go to the ER like a sane person, then you're left with me as your nursemaid." Danny pauses for dramatic effect. "Want to reconsider your decision?"

"I think I'll stick with you, even if the hospital nurses are prettier." And yeah, Danny can't argue with that. They've spent so much time at the Hawaii Medical Center, either getting treated or waiting around for victims or witnesses, that Danny has created a mental top ten of the hottest nurses working there.

Well, actually, he has one list of female nurses and one list of male nurses. Danny's an equal-opportunity ogler.

When Steve's done eating, Danny takes his plate. "You want some painkillers? I got Advil and Tylenol here."

Taking the Tylenol bottle from him, Steve swallows twice the recommended dose. Danny's first instinct is to stop him, because he would never let Grace do that. But he reminds himself that Steve is an autonomous adult, and has somehow survived this long despite being a reckless idiot much of the time.

"You should get some rest now," Danny says as he stands up. "I'm gonna head out and pick up the ingredients for the soup. Do you need anything?"

Steve nods, his eyelids already drooping. "There's a few things on the grocery list stuck to the fridge, if you wouldn't mind getting them too."

"Okay, I can do that. What about the drugstore – anything there that would help?" Danny's fishing for information, yeah, but he's also making a genuine offer. Steve shakes his head, and yawns widely.

Danny rearranges the pillows so Steve can lie down, then reaches out to lay his hand on Steve's forehead again.

"Damn, you're still running one hell of a fever." Steve shivers under his touch, so Danny pulls up the comforter and tucks it close around him.

Steve murmurs, "Thank you, Danno," and closes his eyes. Danny stands there for another few seconds, looking down at him. It takes a lot of effort to turn around and leave the room.

***

Chapter Text

The grocery store is crowded, reminding Danny why he tries to avoid shopping on a Saturday. He picks up everything on his mental list – he really hadn't been kidding about having the chicken soup recipe memorized – and Steve's written list.

Steve writes in steeply-sloping capitals, like a man who's in a hurry but needs to make himself understood. A handwriting analyst would have a field day with Steve...hell, any kind of analyst would. Even his issues have issues, and that was before one of his friends tried to kill him.

Danny picks up the Honolulu paper at the checkout, suppressing a sigh. God, he misses waking up to find the New York Times on his doorstep; he can read it online, sure, but it's just not the same. Danny would even settle for the Newark Star-Ledger, which he used to skim-read in his precinct's break room. He thought it was full of boring local news, back then. Now he'd treasure every word.

He stops by his apartment and packs a bag of spare clothes, since he doesn't know how long Steve will need him to stay. It actually might be a good idea to stockpile some stuff at the McGarrett house anyway, considering how often they need to get changed during a case (Danny's lost count of the shirts he's had ruined since joining Five-0). Stopping at both his place and Steve's seems like a waste of time when there's important work to do.

Danny picks up a book about the Yankees from his desk – his brother sent it as a birthday present, and it's been gathering dust ever since. The soup takes a couple of hours to cook, so he'll have time to do some reading this afternoon.

His laptop is on the desk too, and Danny's fingers itch to start researching everything he's seen and heard since last night. But he'll do Steve the courtesy of waiting 'til he's healthy again.

Back at the house, Danny checks on Steve and finds him fast asleep, breathing steadily. He's kicked off the covers but is no longer shivering; the chills stage of his fever must have passed.

Danny fixes himself a sandwich, and reads the paper as he eats. The cover story is about Governor Jameson's chances of re-election in 2012. It's hard for Danny to think about her in the purely political sense, when she's practically his direct boss. He's always been a conscientious voter, but he might skip the gubernatorial section of the ballot paper come next Election Day.

Poll results indicate that the governor's popularity has been increasing recently. Danny wonders if it's a coincidence that the upward trend started after she created her task force. Five-0 has left a trail of collateral damage across the islands, as Danny's repeatedly and loudly pointed out to Steve. But they've done some damn good work too, and maybe the local folks are starting to appreciate the results.

Despite all his perfectly justified complaints, Danny is proud of what he's achieved here in the past few months. It'd be so boring to go back to ordinary police work after this, even if it would lower his blood pressure and possibly raise his life expectancy.

And God help him, but he'd really miss Steve.

***

Danny washes his hands and starts on the soup, losing himself in the familiar rhythms: preparing the chicken, chopping the vegetables, and skimming the fat off the top. It's the first time he's done this in Hawaii. Making soup just for himself is too depressing a prospect, and Grace hasn't needed this type of traditional medicine since she moved here. Whatever else Danny may hate about this place, at least the climate's good for his little girl's health.

As he works, he thinks about his mother. She'd insisted that all four of her kids – sons as well as daughters – learn this recipe that her beloved Italian grandmother had brought over from the old country. Danny can clearly remember Ma standing at the stove, waving a wooden spoon around, as she talked about the ingredients and proportions and method.

The smell of the soup is the most evocative thing of all, a scent memory transporting Danny across 2,000 miles of ocean and 3,000 miles of land to home. Steve had given him shit about being homesick for Jersey's restaurants...Christ, it's hard to believe that conversation only happened yesterday. But truly, it's his mother's kitchen that he misses the most.

Danny gets to the point where he can leave the broth alone to simmer. So he brews some coffee, sits down in one of the chairs outside, and calls his parents in Jersey. Ma answers, and they swap news of Grace and the rest of the family for a few minutes. Danny mentions that he's making great-grandma's chicken soup for his sick partner, and she approves warmly.

In the background, he can hear the bubbling of the pasta Ma's cooking for supper; his folks always eat late on a Saturday, after coming home from evening Mass. There's also the faint sound of the game Pop's watching in the next room. Danny feels a wave of homesickness wash over him, and his view of the ocean goes blurry.

These days, Danny has some idea of how his great-grandmother must have felt after leaving Italy.

He talks to Pop for a while, getting a blow-by-blow of the game that's almost as good as watching it himself, before hanging up and going back inside to check on the soup.

Danny's just sat down with his Yankees book, at last, when he hears a low groan from upstairs. Letting the paperback fall to the floor, he takes the stairs two at a time. Steve is spread-eagled on the bed, sweat-slicked chest heaving, head twitching from side to side and eyelids flickering. Danny assumes he's having a nasty fever dream and moves closer, intending to wake him up.

But two things stop him: the sight of Steve's erection, clearly outlined by his close-fitting pajamas; and the sound of Steve moaning Danny's name, and not in the 'I'm having a nightmare that my partner's in danger' kind of way. Apparently it's a different type of dream altogether. Danny backs out of the room and heads back downstairs, feeling shocked and confused and more than a little turned on.

'Cos yeah, he's been interested in Steve since they met. Danny was attracted despite himself, at first, when the guy seemed like a jackass lunatic who just happened to be stupidly hot. As he got to know Steve it became stronger and more real, based on his many excellent qualities as well as his physical appeal.

But Danny had no idea that Steve felt the same thing – hell, no idea that he might swing that way at all. So much for gaydar, huh? To be fair, though, if Steve is into guys, he's probably been in stealth mode for years. 'Don't ask, don't tell' may be getting repealed sometime soon, but Steve's presumably still subject to it.

So Danny can't do anything with this information, or not yet anyway. You can't hold a person's subconscious thoughts against them, especially when they're injured and sick. Still, the idea of Steve dreaming about him makes Danny's heart beat faster, and his mind fills with explicit images of the two of them together.

He stirs the soup far more vigorously than it deserves, then goes back to the couch. He doesn't have the concentration for reading anymore, so he attempts the crosswords and Sudoku puzzles in the paper. Danny manages to keep himself occupied until it's time to add the pasta and the other finishing touches to the soup.

***

Steve's timing is perfect; he comes downstairs just after Danny does the last taste test, decides the soup is just right, and takes the pot off the heat. Steve manages to navigate the stairs unaided, which is a big improvement on earlier. He looks slightly less gray, and his eyes are clearer. Danny is relieved that he's wearing a bathrobe, because seeing him half-naked right now would be even more of a temptation than usual.

Steve licks his lips and says, "Wow, Danny, that smells incredible. I had no idea you were such a good cook."

"Hey, there's a lot of things you don't know about me," Danny shoots back as he ladles the soup into bowls, and Steve raises an eyebrow at him.

"Really? I thought you'd told me your life story several times over by now – sure feels like it, anyway."

He must be feeling better if he can engage in mockery, so Danny settles for a glare rather than arguing. He doesn't want to dwell on the things Steve doesn't know, like the fact Danny's bisexual or that he has this massive crush on Steve.

Steve makes an appreciative mmm noise as he takes his first mouthful, smiling across at Danny who feels absurdly pleased. It was worth all the time and effort of making the soup, just to hear that sound. Taylor hurt Steve 24 hours ago, and this is the happiest Danny's seen him since.

Steve manages two helpings, which is another good sign of recovery. Once Danny's done eating, he reaches over to feel his partner's forehead: definitely cooler now, thank God. Steve holds himself still under his touch.

"Let me check your dressings," Danny says, and Steve obediently opens his robe and lets it slip down to reveal his upper arms. Both bandages are clean and dry, and that bitter burning smell seems to have faded. Steve is clearly still exhausted, though, as he's allowing Danny to fuss over him without complaint.

"Right," Danny says, "back to bed."

Steve yawns. "Okay. Thanks for the soup, and for being a great nurse today."

"I've had worse patients," Danny says, and it's entirely true. Rachel had always been grouchy as hell when she was sick, her tongue even sharper than usual.

And once, when she had the flu and was flailing around in a fever dream, Gracie not only kicked Danny in the balls but also smacked him hard enough to cause a nosebleed. That had been a seriously unpleasant night.

"Well, I should be fine by Monday, so you can pick me up as usual," Steve says.

"Oh, no, my friend," Danny replies, "what makes you think you can get rid of me that easy? I'm staying here tonight, and Sunday night too if you're still sick."

"I can take care of myself," Steve protests, trying and failing to stifle another yawn.

"I don't doubt that you can perform field surgery on yourself – while hanging upside down from a tree, maybe, or even underwater if you feel like an extra challenge. But this silver allergy thing is awful, and nobody should have to suffer through it alone."

As he speaks, Danny's watching Steve closely...and yeah, there's that tiny flinch again. Does repeating the cover story back to him trigger a painful memory, something older and even worse than Taylor's betrayal?

But Steve says nothing, and Danny goes on. "I'll crash on the couch if necessary, though I'd prefer an actual bed. So: where can I sleep?"

After another moment of silence, where Danny can't read his expression at all, Steve offers, "My old room only has a single bed, and it's not made up. But you're welcome to it."

"That's mighty hospitable of you, partner," Danny drawls, and Steve manages a small grin.

The soup has cooled off, so Danny pours it into Tupperware containers and sticks it in the fridge; he'll deal with the dishes tomorrow. He stays close behind as they head upstairs, but Steve's reassuringly steady on his feet.

Steve goes to take another shower, promising to keep his dressings dry, and Danny opens the linen closet to grab some sheets – damn, how many years has it been since he last slept in a single? He also pulls out clean sheets for Steve's bed, because it's nice to have fresh bedding when you've been feeling sick and sweaty.

***

Danny's just finishing up in the master bedroom, getting the last creases out of the fitted sheet, when his fingers brush against a small cylindrical object tucked underneath the mattress. He knows he shouldn't look, knows it's an invasion of privacy, but the shower's still running and he's been plagued by unbearable curiosity all day.

Danny's initially disappointed to see that it's just an ordinary plastic pill bottle, with dozens of white tablets inside. Then he reads the label, and realizes that it's actually very weird.

For a start, the drug doesn't have a proper name: it's just called 'Formula 2912'. The label doesn't mention Steve by name, either – the prescription's made out to a 'Subject AF/06/88'. But the bottle's location suggests that Steve's the one taking the pills, whether he's supposed to be or not.

There are other standard elements missing from the label. The dispensing pharmacy isn't identified, and there's no information about the prescribing physician beyond the name 'Dr. Alexander'. And the dosage instructions are strange too: 'Take twice daily, with food, for seven days; repeat on cyclical basis'.

The date on the label is from earlier this year, not long after Steve returned to Hawaii. Danny doesn't remember him ever mentioning any chronic health problems – the guy seems to have an iron constitution, the last 24 hours aside. And you'd have to torture Steve before he'd admit to needing psychiatric medication.

So what are these pills for, and why has Steve been hiding them under his mattress?

Danny hears the water shut off, so he pulls out his phone and snaps a picture of the label. He puts the bottle back where he found it, and then hurries down the hallway. When Steve emerges from the bathroom a few minutes later, Danny's in his old room wrestling a pillow into its slip.

Steve gives him a tired smile and says, "'Night, Danny," as he walks past the doorway.

"Sleep well," Danny replies, like he always tells Grace. He bites his lip to keep from adding the automatic follow-up: 'Danno loves you'. It might well be true, but he's far from ready to say it to Steve.

Danny's worn out, but he feels too wired to sleep. He sits on the edge of the bed, and stares at the photo he just took.

His first theory is that Steve might be an addict. Before yesterday, Danny would have laughed at the idea; his partner's the ultimate 'my body is my temple' type, swimming for miles each morning and shunning malasadas. Now Danny has to reconsider everything he thought he knew about Steve, and contemplate every possibility.

But perhaps the pills are a legitimate prescription, intended for Steve and being used by him as directed.

In that case, the drug and patient names on the label must be encoded for a reason. Is there an embarrassing or deadly disease that Steve's desperate to keep hidden? Or does he have some service-related sickness that the top brass don't want to acknowledge, like an Afghanistan version of Gulf War Syndrome?

Or...could Steve be taking part in a medical experiment? Danny's not a conspiracy theorist or a sci-fi nut, okay. But he can believe that the Pentagon might be exploring innovative ways to enhance the physical and mental condition of its personnel – especially the elite forces.

Who better to test some new 'super soldier' formula than a highly-decorated SEAL commander, recently transferred to the Reserves? Steve's still in excellent shape, despite not being on active duty. And instead of traveling to dangerous places, far from medical oversight, he's living in suburbia with one of the country's best military hospitals nearby. He'd be a great guinea pig, really, what with the stoicism and self-sacrifice.

Huh. Maybe Danny's been reading this whole situation wrong; maybe Steve's odd symptoms and secretive behavior can be explained away by that little bottle of innocuous pills. Danny just doesn't know what to believe, and his head hurts too much to think about it any longer.

He works out how to save the picture to a folder, for future reference, then puts his phone on the bedside table. Lying back on the narrow but comfortable bed, Danny looks around at Steve's childhood room. It seems that Jack McGarrett left it pretty much untouched after sending his son away to the mainland, and that Steve hasn't made any changes since taking over the house.

So there are memories of Steve's adolescence everywhere Danny turns. Unlike the room Danny had as a teenager, there are no movie or music posters on these walls. Instead, there are pictures of Steve's football team, his framed high school diploma, and a first prize pennant from the state science fair. Danny's willing to bet that the winning exhibit was chemistry-related: Steve probably always had an unhealthy interest in blowing shit up.

Danny thinks about browsing the bookshelves, not only to find something to read but also to gain more insights into his partner's past. But he's surprisingly tired now – even the unanswered questions swirling around in his mind aren't enough to keep his eyes open. He strips down to his shorts, switches off the bedside light, and falls asleep soon after.

***

Steve sleeps for much of Sunday, getting up only to use the bathroom and eat. Danny has a quiet morning, reading his Yankees book over a late breakfast. It's well-written and interesting, even if it makes him yearn to go to a decent ball game. Danny makes a mental note to email his brother, and thank him again for the gift.

He calls Chin around eleven, reporting that Steve's knife wound had become infected and that he's been laid low most of the weekend. Chin's concerned, but Danny reassures him that Steve should be better by tomorrow. He hopes he isn't wrong about that.

The broken windows in Steve's living room have to be replaced ASAP, so Danny asks Chin to recommend some local glaziers. They also talk about the other repairs that the McGarrett house will need. Somehow, Danny isn't surprised when Chin names Kamekona as the go-to guy for cheap lumber; the shave ice magnate seems to have a finger in every pie around here.

When Steve comes downstairs around noon, he's still pale but seems to have regained some of his strength. His hair is mussed up from so many hours in bed. Part of Danny's brain thinks it's utterly adorable, while another part wonders if Steve would look like that after several rounds of really fantastic sex.

Christ, Danny's so far gone for this guy. It'd be funny if it weren't kind of pathetic.

He makes grilled cheese sandwiches for lunch, and is pleased to see Steve eating heartily. Once they're done, Danny brings up the urgent need to call a glazier.

"We can't leave the house 'til the windows are secured. You're not up to doing any manual labor, and I don't think I could manage the job alone. It'll cost a fortune to get someone out here today, though," he warns.

"Okay, that's cool. Don't worry, Danny, I can afford it," Steve says, and goes back to bed.

Spoken like a guy who has neither a mortgage nor rent to pay, Danny thinks resentfully, but then he considers what Steve used to do for his paycheck. He hardly ever discusses his work with the SEALs. Still, it's safe to assume that he served his country in vital and incredibly dangerous ways, in places Danny couldn't locate on a map and would never want to visit. If Steve's got a healthy bank balance, he's more than earned it.

So Danny tries the glass contractors Chin suggested, and finds someone willing to work on a Sunday. The guy shows up an hour later with his son, and the two of them spend the afternoon making a racket and a mess. But they install the new windows perfectly and tidy up after themselves, and Danny's pretty happy despite the exorbitant figure on their invoice.

He calls Grace after the glaziers leave, just to hear the sound of her voice. She talks excitedly about going sailing on step-Stan's new yacht yesterday, and Danny grits his teeth.

He'd thought the divorce would get easier to bear...and yeah, it has a little. Danny still misses Rachel, sometimes, and regrets the mistakes he made with her. But he can accept that they weren't good for each other, and that staying together would have damaged their daughter.

It's just so fucking unfair that Stan gets to spoil Grace, gets to take her presence in his life and home for granted, while Danny has his time with her carefully rationed by a judge.

Steve has helped, though, maybe without even knowing it. Danny's non-custody weekends used to be pretty empty and bleak, but Steve's been dragging him out of his apartment and showing him more of the island. And Five-0's work fills Danny's days so completely that he's often too tired to feel sorry for himself at night.

Somehow Steve managed to sleep through all the noise of the window repairs. He comes downstairs at seven, freshly showered and looking healthier. They have soup for supper again, then Danny runs to the store and picks up his favorite cookie dough ice cream for dessert.

He badgers Steve into eating some: "you're still running a low-grade fever, okay, and this will help cool your system down." Steve shoots him a dubious look, but accepts the bowl without argument. They spend the rest of the evening watching football together, Danny yelling at the ref through a mouthful of ice cream and Steve laughing at him from the other end of the couch.

It's the most relaxing day Danny's had for a long, long while.

***

Chapter Text

By Monday morning, Steve's mostly okay again. He's still pale, and he looks worn out despite sleeping the weekend away. But his fever is gone.

After showering, Steve comes to Danny to have his bandages changed. He's shirtless, and Danny allows himself a brief moment to covertly admire Steve's tattoos – still intact, thankfully, as both the knife and bullet had just missed them. As always, he wants to run his fingertips across the colorful designs. As always, he holds himself back.

When Danny removes the old dressings, he sees that Steve's wounds are practically healed. The blackened layer has flaked off, leaving new pink skin underneath. He thinks about demanding answers from Steve: how can he possibly have recovered so soon? Did he always heal fast, or has it developed more recently? Does the bottle of pills hidden under his mattress have something to do with it?

But Steve's mental and verbal capabilities seem to be back to normal, with all his defenses re-established. Danny knows better than to expect anything now besides evasion, or even straight-out lies. He'll have to go looking for answers on his own.

"These are healing up nicely," is all Danny says, and Steve nods silently.

Over breakfast, they argue about whether Steve is fit to return to duty.

"I'm not contagious, Danny. It's not like the flu or whatever."

"I bet you'd show up to work even if you had stomach flu, or something else really nasty," Danny counters.

Steve shrugs. "I wouldn't know; I really don't get sick all that often."

Danny figures that Steve's about to extol the virtues of a vigorous daily swim, and maybe the regular consumption of spinach smoothies or something. So he just says, "Okay, fine; let's go. But if you fall asleep over the mountain of paperwork on your desk, I reserve the right to drag your ass back here."

Steve sighs, which is as close as Danny's gonna get to acquiescence. And it's not that he wishes his partner was still sick; of course not. But damn, Danny kind of misses the way he was over the weekend. That version of Steve was much more biddable, for one thing.

More importantly, he let down some of his barriers and let Danny look after him. It wasn't all that Danny wanted, not even close, but it was something. Now they'll revert to being colleagues who maybe slap each other on the back once in a while.

As they're driving to HQ, Danny tells Steve about the wound infection story he gave Chin on Sunday. "It just seemed like the most plausible explanation for you being laid low after the fight with Taylor," he claims. "Also, I kind of figured you didn't want your silver allergy becoming widely known. It's a bit of a liability."

Steve nods, looking relieved. "Yeah, you're right – thanks. I don't like misleading my team, but I can live with it in this case."

So when they get to work, Steve's ready to face Chin and Kono with a grin and some reassuring words. Looking at him now, you'd never guess how sick he was at the weekend. Since the others never saw the wounds up close, Danny's cautiously optimistic that the cover story will hold.

Monday turns out to be a quiet day, spent catching up with the ongoing investigations they'd set aside to deal with Agent Atwater's murder. Danny makes Steve stay put most of the time, bringing him lunch and ensuring he drinks enough water. "Do some of the admin stuff you've been neglecting, or play a hundred games of Solitaire...I really don't care. Just take it easy, okay?"

Danny volunteers to liaise with HPD over the General Pak mess. It's partly to save Steve any added stress, but mostly because he wants to be the one who receives CSU's report.

He gets the call late that afternoon, and closes his office door behind him before taking it. It's the senior forensics analyst on the phone, Kumiko Watanabe, and she briefly outlines the test results. As Danny had thought, Taylor's knife is pure silver. And just like Steve had suggested, the bullet that grazed him is made of silver too.

Danny's dealt with Kumiko quite a bit since he first joined HPD, and he has a lot of respect for her. Despite delivering the lab's findings in a straightforward way, she sounds super curious – and who wouldn't be? Silver weapons do seem like a seriously strange choice for an experienced ex-SEAL to bring to a firefight.

He knows that telling her it's all classified will only fuel the flames of speculation. So Danny spins some bullshit about Taylor being mentally disturbed, and convinced that God wanted him to kill the General and his protective detail. He'd come armed with silver in the belief that Pak and the Five-0 team were aliens, who would dissolve when struck with the metal.

"Really? Wow, what a nutbar," Kumiko says with a laugh. Danny's sure some version of that story will soon be bouncing around the department. Ma always told him never to speak ill of the dead, but he thinks she'd excuse him for maligning Taylor under these circumstances.

If there's something on those weapons that would explain Steve's symptoms, Danny wants to know ASAP. So he asks Kumiko to conduct some further tests.

"Commander McGarrett has developed an infection from his knife wound," Danny explains. She makes a small sound of worry that sounds more personal than professional, and Danny files that away for later.

"So please make this a top priority, Kumiko," Danny goes on. "We've got to find out if there was something nasty on that blade – any harmful substances, or anything else that doesn't belong there. Same with the bullet, too, just to cover all the bases. We already know it's Steve's blood on there, so there's no need to do a DNA test or anything. Just a straight tox screen on the silver itself, as soon as you can."

"Yes, of course," she says. "I'll handle it myself."

***

Danny drops Steve at his house, insisting that he skip his usual evening work-out and get some rest. Then he goes back to his apartment, sticks a frozen pizza in the oven, and boots up his laptop. He didn't want to risk doing anything on his desktop at HQ, so this is the first opportunity he's had to investigate what the hell is going on with Steve.

Danny knows how to enable private browsing, a first line of defense against anyone wanting to snoop around in his internet history. But he's well aware that there's other ways for online searching to be monitored.

So he calls Toast.

The hacker sounds stoned, as usual, but sufficiently lucid for Danny's purposes. After agreeing that yeah, man, tonight's sunset looks amazing, Danny gets down to business.

"Listen, I wanted to get your advice about online security," Danny says. "I'm looking into something potentially big, and I want to do the research on my home computer. Thing is, I'll probably need to check out some super nasty and highly illegal sites, but I don't want to raise any red flags. So can you suggest a way of covering my tracks? I can manage private browsing; beyond that, I'm lost."

"Can't you just do it at work, instead? You Five-0 guys can get away with pretty much anything," Toast says, his tone skeptical. It's a fair point, but Danny already has an answer planned.

"Yeah, no, not this time. I suspect that some pretty important figures are involved, including guys in law enforcement and the state government. I need to keep this totally off the radar 'til I get more evidence, okay?"

"No problem, Jersey, I gotcha covered," Toast says. Then he proceeds to explain how to shield his internet activity from prying eyes. Danny kind of understands terms like 'proxy' and 'anonymizer', but gives up once 'onion routing' gets mentioned.

"Hey, can you just dumb it down for me, man?" Danny asks. Toast sighs, but gives him the name of a free program that'll do the trick, spells out the URL where he can download it, and patiently walks Danny through the installation process.

Danny thanks Toast for his help, promising to swing by with a load of his favorite candy sometime soon, and hangs up. He goes to the kitchen to fill a plate with pizza, bypasses the beer in favor of soda – he wants a clear head for this – and then gets to work.

The obvious place to start is the pill bottle he'd found under Steve's mattress. Danny had memorized the label, but he brings up the picture on his phone for reference.

The prescription is made out to 'Subject 06/AF/88'. Danny searches for that and gets zilch. The drug name, 'Formula 2912', only brings up a dozen results: a bunch of useless sites, plus a forum for military families. The relevant post's been deleted, but the cached version's still available.

The post was made six months ago, by the wife of an Army Ranger who'd killed himself soon after returning home from Afghanistan. She went through her husband's kit, a few days later, and found a bottle of white tablets labeled 'Formula 2912'. Asking his former comrades and commanding officers about it got her nowhere, so she'd turned to the forum members for help.

The only reply to the widow's post came from a woman whose son, a captain in the Marines, was on the same mysterious formula. He'd told his mother that the pills were to treat a chronic condition he'd picked up in Afghanistan, but that he was forbidden to talk about it.

Huh, Danny thinks. That's in keeping with Steve's secretive behavior, but it doesn't explain what the drug is for.

Danny's next move is to google the only actual name on the prescription. There are plenty of American doctors with the surname Alexander, but not too many employed by the armed forces (and the one Danny's after must be military, if servicemen from three different branches were taking the same pills). That will narrow it down, at least.

It turns out there's a Dr. Joan Alexander working at Walter Reed, the main army hospital in D.C. She isn't the usual kind of physician, though; instead, she's a lead biomedical researcher in the Experimental Therapeutics Division. Well, that certainly fits with Danny's hypothesis about a top-secret drug trial. But she could also be developing a treatment for some disease or syndrome that Steve and those other guys have.

***

Danny seems to have reached a dead end with the prescription. So he changes tack, and focuses instead on Steve's physical symptoms.

Steve got shot in the arm, by Hesse, on the team's first job together; he suffered a nasty burn to his lower leg on their second job together, after those gas canisters blew the building and rained fiery debris down on them. And Danny's seen him injured in many ways since then.

His partner should get frequent flyer points at the ER, seriously – and Danny should get access to a VIP waiting room, where there's decent coffee. If Hawaii is the only state that grows coffee, then how come the vending machines at Honolulu's main hospital serve instant that's worse than what Danny would get back in Jersey?

Danny's brain is clearly in need of caffeine now; he gulps down his soda, and opens another. Chewing on a slice of lukewarm pizza, he thinks back to Steve's previous wounds. Even if Steve got some of them in pretty improbable ways, none ever reacted like the ones from Friday night.

But Steve heals rapidly – much faster than Danny himself does, as proven beyond doubt a few weeks ago. They'd been sheltering behind a parked car one sunny afternoon, exchanging fire with crystal meth manufacturers who'd strenuously objected to Five-0 shutting down their lab. The passenger window had shattered above them, leaving both Danny and Steve with multiple minor cuts.

Two days later, Danny's scratches had scabbed over but Steve's were gone. When Danny pointed this out, Steve had said something about fast healing being linked to having a fast metabolism. Then he'd launched into this long, detailed spiel about the benefits of SEAL-style physical training for improving your metabolic rate.

Danny had eventually interrupted and changed the subject, pretty much forgetting about his original question. Looking back, it seems likely that Steve had deliberately tried to distract him.

Now that Danny thinks about it, that nasty cut on Steve's forehead – obtained when their SUV crashed during last Friday's motorcade – was only a couple of hours older than the bullet graze and knife gash. But it had healed almost entirely by Saturday morning, whereas the other wounds had taken a couple of days to reach that point.

So it must be the silver that made the difference.

Danny starts his new line of enquiry by typing in 'silver allergy', and soon discovers that it's a real thing...kind of. The contact dermatitis some people get is actually due to the presence of nickel in silver jewelry. It also looks like ingested silver can build up in the body, resulting in bluish-gray skin or even internal organ damage if taken in excessive amounts.

But none of the medical sites mention symptoms like blackened skin, a bitter smell, and a high fever. So Steve's reaction to the metal is abnormal, to say the least – and maybe scientifically inexplicable, unless Kumiko's tests show the presence of some other toxin.

What about a non-scientific explanation, then? Danny had promised himself that he'd consider every option. It can't hurt to do a little reading on the supernatural side of things.

So he types 'werewolf' and 'silver' into Google, bites his lip, and presses search.

The results pretty much tell Danny what he already knew from horror movies and popular culture. Silver has long been believed to be effective against werewolves; some cultures hold that a silver knife or bullet through the heart is the only way to kill one.

The sites seem divided as to whether a werewolf in its human form can be murdered in normal ways, or if silver weapons are the only option. Since General Pak's visit was scheduled for a moonless night, Taylor must have believed that silver would work on Steve regardless.

Danny digs into some of the more sane-looking mythology sites – the ones without spelling errors or flashing multicolored text – and reads about werewolf lore. The concept of humans transforming into animals is an ancient one, and exists pretty much everywhere. Interestingly, though, the belief in werewolves is particularly strong in Central Asia. So Steve and Taylor could have come across the stories (if not the creatures themselves) while stationed in Afghanistan.

Searching for 'Afghanistan' and 'werewolves' brings up more specific discussion of local mythology. It also produces some results in Russian, piquing Danny's curiosity. Running a few pages through auto-translate gives Danny a garbled approximation of English, but it's enough to make him sit up and pay attention.

The sites claim that the Soviet Union, which occupied Afghanistan for most of the 1980s, found out about the country's werewolf problem the hard way. A bunch of Russian soldiers were found dead, horribly mutilated, on nights when the moon was full. At first it was assumed that Afghan rebels were responsible, or – given the teeth and claw marks visible on some victims – wild animals.

But then some Russians survived an attack, describing the creature responsible as a huge wolf. A month later, the bitten men transformed into wolves themselves and started to savage their comrades. None of the usual weapons could kill them, and the werewolves escaped.

For years afterwards, there were ongoing sightings of white men living wild in the mountains of Afghanistan and roaming around in packs. Russian troops fired upon them, when ordered; though some of the deserters were certainly hit, their bodies were never found.

Apparently something changed in the late 80s, a couple of years before the USSR pulled out of Afghanistan. Although Russian soldiers continued to be bitten on moonlit nights, the number of new werewolves stopped going up. The websites speculate as to why: did the Soviets figure out a cure, or did they start brutally executing all survivors of werewolf attacks?

Danny's aware that the authors of these accounts could be crackpots, the Russian equivalent of those freaks who wear tinfoil hats to protect them against aliens. He has absolutely no way of verifying the claims. Still, it all makes for fascinating reading.

He does more looking around, but can't find any equivalent info about American servicemen being bitten in Afghanistan. Not surprising, really; the Pentagon probably has a basement full of nerds who are paid to scour the web, looking for sites that might compromise secrecy.

Danny slumps down in his chair, flexing his wrists, and realizes with a start that it's 2am. He takes a swig of now-flat soda, trying to process everything.

Afghanistan is the only common link, so far, between the American personnel taking 'Formula 2912'; it's also where those Russian soldiers supposedly got bitten by werewolves.

He looks again at the code from the pill bottle. If 'AF' stands for the name of the country, then maybe '06' is short for 2006. Steve was probably in Afghanistan, that year. Danny has no idea about '88', though. Could it mean that Steve was the 88th serviceman to develop some terrible disease while stationed there?

Or – Danny lets himself think it – the 88th to get bitten? If so: fuck, there's a lot of werewolves in the US military.

If the patient name means something, maybe the drug name '2912' does too. On a hunch, Danny looks up the lunar cycle. There it is, right at the top of the results page: 1 lunar cycle = 29.53059 days. And as every school kid knows, the moon rotates around the Earth 12 times per year.

Jesus Christ. Steve really might be a werewolf.

***

Kumiko calls on Tuesday, just before noon, to say she has the test results. Luckily for Danny, Steve's in a budget meeting with the governor. It's not so lucky for Steve himself, who's probably never had to justify his exorbitant expenditure on ammo to any higher authority.

So Danny tells Chin and Kono he's heading out for lunch, and drives over to the CSU lab.

"I examined both items for various substances," Kumiko says, "and found nothing dangerous. The silver bullet has blood on it, and plaster and paint residue that can be explained by it being retrieved from a wall. There's sand and blood on the knife, but no toxins."

It's what Danny had expected, though part of him was hoping that science would come through with a rational answer. "Okay, thanks," he says. "I guess Steve just has a standard bacterial infection, even if he thinks it's beneath him to suffer something so ordinary."

"How's Commander McGarrett doing?" There's genuine concern in her voice, plus a telltale softening around her eyes. Like Danny had thought, Kumiko has a thing for Steve. She's smart, kind, beautiful, and has a great body from what he's glimpsed under the lab coat. The depressing thing is, she probably has more chance with Steve than Danny does.

Forcing himself to focus, Danny says, "He had a pretty miserable weekend, but he's fine now."

She smiles, and he goes on. "Listen, there's a reason I came over in person today, but you won't be too happy about it."

Danny steels himself: he likes Kumiko, and hates lying to her face. But he's willing to do this, and a lot worse, for Steve's sake. If he has an outer limit, a point where he'd let Steve get hurt for the sake of his scruples, then Danny's yet to find it.

"I need to get this knife and bullet from you, right now, because a federal agency is taking over the whole Taylor mess. They want the physical evidence, your reports, and any computer files relating to the case. I'm supposed to make sure that absolutely nothing remains on your computers or servers."

Kumiko looks confused. "Wait, the FBI want all our records? They usually just demand copies."

"It's not the Feds, actually. I wish it was; God, they'd be a cakewalk compared to these guys." Danny shrugs and puts an apologetic expression on his face. "I can't tell you which agency we're dealing with here, Kumiko. But they do not mess around, and we can't risk pissing them off. These jerks never got the memo about interagency co-operation, and they seem to think information-sharing only flows one way."

"Damn," Kumiko says. "You're the meat in a jurisdictional sandwich, huh?" She doesn't sound too surprised, though. Danny guesses that Hawaiians are used to mainlanders in suits showing up and taking over, with arrogant disregard for local procedures and ways.

He has the sudden, uncomfortable thought that his own behavior since moving here could be described in similar terms. Shit. Danny puts that aside to deal with later.

Kumiko hands over the knife and bullet, her printed reports, and a USB stick containing all the forensic findings and crime scene photos. While Danny waits, she deletes the files from CSU's system and asks the IT department to wipe them from the server back-up as well.

It might not be the perfect cover-up, but it's the best Danny can manage. He thanks Kumiko, apologizes again for the hassle, and walks out with the evidence.

***

Chapter Text

Danny stashes the CSU evidence in a safe place when he gets home on Tuesday, and goes back to his research. He reads about lycanthropy until his eyes start to swim, taking a break only when his Chinese take-out arrives.

He goes through more Russian websites about Afghanistan, and comes across a few accounts written in English by Afghan exiles. One makes the intriguing claim that some rebel fighters had deliberately become werewolves during the 1980s, in order to terrorize and demoralize the Soviet occupiers. If that's true, then maybe the insurgents currently battling NATO forces are using the same tactic.

He also finds some tantalizing references to a weird chronic condition being suffered by American troops who've fought in Afghanistan, but nothing concrete. The Pentagon's basement-dwellers must be keeping this thing pretty quiet.

Danny looks up Dr. Alexander again, and sees that she's had research papers published in major medical journals. He tries to skim-read a few of her articles, but it's all Greek to him. He guesses she wouldn't dare refer to something as secret as 'Formula 2912' even in the vaguest terms.

He doesn't fall asleep 'til well after midnight, his brain still thinking up medical euphemisms for werewolf transformation despite his body's exhaustion.

Five-0 gets an urgent call on Wednesday morning, a hostage situation at a Waikiki hotel. Resolving the standoff without casualties – and trying to stay calm after Steve exchanges himself for one of the hostages, again – keeps Danny's mind occupied all day. He's too tired that night to do anything but fall into bed.

Danny spends Thursday evening online as well, making some final checks and making a plan. And when he goes to pick Steve up on Friday morning, he says, "Hey, are we on for dinner tonight at your place? I want to run something by you."

"Uh, sure," Steve says. "Is everything okay?"

"I'm fine," Danny reassures him. "There's just a thing I need to discuss with you. It's nothing bad, honest."

"Right," Steve says, his tone suggesting he's not convinced. "Well, we can pick up some steaks on the way home, and grill out. Should be a nice warm evening."

"It's always warm here," Danny complains. "It's like Hawaii heard of the concept of four distinct seasons and went, 'Whatever, brah, that's way too much work'." But his dislike of the island is becoming more pro forma than real, and they both know it.

Steve's on edge all day, giving Danny these side glances that he probably thinks are subtle and absent-mindedly scratching at the skin around his bandages. Danny would bet that his injuries are fully healed already, and that the dressings are only there to hide that fact.

Outwardly, at least, Steve seems to have totally recovered from Taylor's attack. The worrying pallor is gone, thankfully, and he's back to his normal golden tan. There are pictures online of people with permanently discolored skin from swallowing too much silver; it's not a pretty sight. But Danny admits to himself that he'd still want Steve even if he was stained bluish-gray.

Thank God they haven't got an urgent case right now, because Danny's distracted too. He has this strange cognitive dissonance thing going on. He can look at Steve and think 'lunatic partner, best friend, hopeless crush', just like always, but then get this sudden rush of suspicion and doubt and anxiety.

Danny keeps second-guessing himself. Should he say anything tonight, or let it slide? Is it worth risking everything they've built up, professionally and personally? What if he's wrong?

What if he's right?

***

After dinner, Danny and Steve sit outside and watch the sun sink over the ocean. Their usual Friday night kick back has been weirdly awkward so far. Though they're only two feet apart, there's a whole world of silence between them. And abruptly, Danny decides to just go for it.

"So here's the thing, Steve." Once Steve's turned towards him, Danny says, "I'm pretty sure you're a werewolf."

Steve's got much better self-control now he's not sick and feverish, so Danny doesn't see him flinch this time. But his face suddenly goes blank and his body tenses up, like Danny's revealed himself to be an enemy agent hell-bent on interrogating Steve.

"What? I'm not a...that's ridiculous, Danny." Steve even manages to inject a little incredulous laughter into his voice.

It's an impressive front, but Danny's not buying it for a second. "Yeah, no – you know what? Let's assume that you denied it, and I outlined all the evidence I've put together since last Friday, and you finally admitted it. It'd save us both some time, and then we could move on to the interesting stuff."

Though Steve's trying so hard to appear calm, his rapid breathing and widened eyes give away his true state. Danny's never seen Steve look like this before, and it makes his heart ache to be the cause of such distress. But he's started this now; he has to see it through.

"You remember I'm a detective, right?" Danny goes on in a softer tone, when Steve doesn't speak. "A pretty good one, if I do say it myself. So give me some credit, here."

Steve abruptly stands up, and Danny forces himself to remain still. He doesn't want to shrink back or show fear; doesn't want to give Steve any reason to freak out further. But Steve moves away from Danny, striding down to the water's edge and gazing out to sea.

Danny stays where he is, sipping his beer and trying to be patient. The ball's in Steve's court now.

Steve stands there with his back to Danny for long minutes, hands clenched at his sides. Danny wonders what's going through his head. Is he formulating a plausible denial, planning his escape...or plotting how to kill Danny and get away with it?

Christ, he hopes he hasn't misjudged Steve that badly. Dying at the hands of a criminal is one thing; Danny faces that danger nearly every day, despite all the precautions he tries to take. But being murdered by his partner would be far worse, especially because Steve used to kill for the federal government. He'd be so chillingly good at it that they'd never find Danny's body, which would make it even harder on Grace and his folks.

When Steve eventually comes back, he sinks into his chair and downs most of his beer in one long swallow. Then he says, "For a guy who thinks I'm some kind of nightmarish monster, you don't seem very scared."

"I don't think you're a monster," Danny says firmly. "If you were going to kill me, I'd be dead already. If you were going to bite me, you could've done that on any of the full moons there've been since we met." He shrugs. "Anyway, I found the medication in your room that suppresses the transformation."

Steve leans forward, looking at Danny accusingly. "You went through my stuff? Fuck, Danny, that's way out of line."

Danny raises his right hand. "I did not go looking, swear to God. Last Saturday, I changed your sheets while you were in the shower, and I came across the pill bottle under the mattress. But I was already suspicious before then – I knew that smoke coming off your wounds couldn't be from a standard silver allergy."

"So have you talked to anyone about this?" Steve demands.

"Of course not! Jesus, Steve, you're still my partner and I've still got your back."

Danny ticks off on his fingers everything he's done this past week. "I lied to Chin for you. I used a proxy anonymizer thing to cover my tracks when I did all the online research. I got Taylor's knife and the silver bullet off CSU, plus all their files about him, after I told Kumiko Watanabe a series of very creative lies. The evidence is hidden at my place, and you're welcome to take it if you want. I did snap a picture of the pill bottle, but the only copy is on my phone. Here, you can delete it yourself."

Steve takes Danny's phone and presses a few buttons, then hands it back. "Okay." He looks only marginally less pissed off, though.

"Maybe I should've left well enough alone, and not gone digging," Danny says. "But you know how I am – I just can't leave a puzzle unsolved."

Steve tilts his head to the side slightly, acknowledging the point. "Yeah, but what makes you a great cop can also make you a shitty friend."

Danny winces. During one of their many bitter arguments, Rachel had accused him of never being able to leave his badge at the door. He'd denied it, at the time, though in hindsight she was probably right.

"I'm sorry I invaded your privacy, Steve," he says. "I did it because I was insanely curious, but also because I was seriously concerned about you. Still, you have every right to be angry with me."

"Just...just shut up for a minute and let me think," Steve says, slumping back in his seat and staring up at the sky. Danny closes his eyes, and prays that he hasn't fucked up the best thing that's happened to him since Grace was born.

Steve's quiet for so long that the sound of his voice startles Danny. "What do you want from me, here?"

Danny chooses his words carefully. "I want answers – I can't deny that. But mostly, I want to make sure you understand something. Look at me, Steven."

He waits until Steve meets his gaze. Then Danny says, slowly and distinctly, "You're my partner and my closest friend, and that hasn't changed. I've trusted you with my life every day for months, and you have never let me down. I'll trust you tomorrow and next week and next year too."

Steve is watching him intently, barely breathing.

"I trust you with Gracie's life, too, because I know you'd rather die than hurt her. Hell, I'd trust you even if it was just you and my daughter, out in the middle of nowhere, on the night of the full moon."

Steve's mouth drops open at that, but Danny's not done. "I'd appreciate it if you trusted me too, because I'd really like to know what's happened to you. But if you can't tell me, then at least trust me not to betray you. I'm in your corner, here, and that's never going to change. You got that?"

"Yes, Danno," Steve says, his voice sounding choked and his eyes glistening. Danny's pretty damn emotional too, his pulse racing and his vision blurred. That wasn't a declaration of love, but it still feels like he offered Steve his heart on a plate.

***

He wipes at his eyes and pretends not to see Steve doing the same. Some of the tension's gone out of Steve's posture, and Danny thinks he's broken through those defensive walls at last. He can almost see the wheels turn in Steve's head, reclassifying Danny from an enemy agent to a potential ally.

Danny starts peeling the label off his beer bottle in strips, to give his restless hands something to do. "So have we established my bona fides to a sufficient extent? You can search me if you like. I might be carrying a tranq gun that shoots silver-tipped darts, for all you know."

Steve doesn't smile, but his expression seems to clear a little. "I hate to think where you'd be hiding it, then, seeing as your holster's empty. Why'd you leave your gun inside the house tonight, anyway?"

"Show of good faith," Danny says simply.

"Well, I appreciate that, and everything else you've said," Steve replies. "And I do trust you, Danny, honestly. I just can't tell you. This subject is so highly classified, even I don't have the clearance to know about it."

"But you do know," Danny points out, "because you're personally affected."

Steve bites his lip and says nothing. He's obviously taking this whole 'top secret' thing very seriously.

"Well, okay," Danny says, "how about I explain what I've learned, and you give me 'yes' or 'no' answers."

"I really can't." Steve sounds genuinely regretful, and Danny gets the impression that he actually wants to talk about this, now. But his sense of duty is outweighing the desire to unburden himself.

Danny's come this far; he's not giving up without a fight. So he tries one last time. "Could you at least indicate the accuracy of my deductions via subtle facial movements?"

There's a long moment of silence, where Steve's expression suggests that he's arguing with himself. Then he says, "All right. Should we work out some kind of code, first, or will you figure it out as we go?"

"Smart ass," Danny says affectionately. "Fine, how about this: raising your eyebrows equals 'affirmative', and wrinkling your nose equals 'negative'."

Steve says, "Okay," and leans back in his chair. He's not wearing his 'I can cope with torture' face, but he hardly seems relaxed either.

Now he's talked Steve into this, Danny's not sure where to start.

He'd approached the research like a criminal investigation, following leads and crossing possibilities off the list. If this was a real case, he'd outline the evidence to his boss at this point and seek permission to arrest the prime suspect. Of course, in this situation the person he's been investigating is his boss, and Danny certainly doesn't want to arrest him – wrong verb entirely. He shakes his head slightly to clear it.

"So here's what I figure," he says. "Back in '06 you were on a mission in Afghanistan, out in the mountains probably. On a moonlit night, you got bitten by a wolf that couldn't be killed with standard weapons. Nick Taylor was there and he saw the whole thing. That's how he knew to come armed with silver, last Friday."

Steve's sitting stock-still, hardly breathing. This must be difficult for him to hear, after years of secrecy. But he doesn't stop Danny; he just raises his eyebrows a notch.

"I guess you got taken to a US military hospital somewhere. They probably kept you there for a while, patching up your injuries and running tests to find out if you'd been infected."

Another mute 'affirmative'. So far, so good.

"When the next full moon came, did the doctors make you transform?"

Steve flinches so hard that his whole body shudders. Oh God, Danny thinks, they did. How unbelievably awful.

"Wait, no, I'm sorry –" he says quickly, but it's too late to take the question back. Steve has covered his face with his hands, taking deep ragged breaths. Danny curses himself for pushing too hard, for prioritizing his curiosity over his partner's wellbeing. Steve was right: he is a shitty friend.

His own mind punishes Danny with vivid images of Steve as a wolf, locked up and howling in pain. But the live-action movie probably playing inside Steve's head right now has got to be even worse.

"Fuck, Steve, I'm so sorry," Danny says softly, once Steve seems calmer. "I shouldn't have asked you that. We can stop right now, and never talk about this again."

Surprisingly, though, Steve raises his head and says, "Keep going." His eyes are wet but his expression is determined.

"Are you sure?"

"Yes," Steve says, lifting the hem of his shirt to dry his face. "You want to know, and I want you to know. It's tougher than I expected, having you say it out loud, but I'm not going to break. So keep going."

***

Danny pauses to take a swig of beer, and tries to think of something that will be easier for Steve to answer. "Uh, okay...are there any upsides to lycanthropy?"

Steve raises his eyebrows.

"I saw how fast you healed – what else you got? Increased speed and strength?"

Steve confirms this, before pointing to his nose, eyes, and ears in turn.

"Enhanced senses? Wow, man," Danny says, "that's very cool."

Steve smiles just a little, for the first time all evening, and he grins back. His partner has superpowers, and yet somehow Danny's not that surprised.

"All right, next question," Danny continues. "Was it the Pentagon's research scientists who developed the '2912' treatment?"

Steve wrinkles his nose, and Danny remembers how the USSR's werewolf problem apparently abated in the late 80s.

"Holy shit," he says, "did they really get it off the Soviets somehow?"

Steve's 'affirmative' makes Danny even more curious, though he doubts Steve knows any more about the drug's history. Was there some Russian defector who brought the formulation with him, in the dying days of the Cold War, or did an undercover agent smuggle it out?

Surely the CIA didn't appreciate what they were getting, at the time – unless, of course, this werewolf phenomenon is way more widespread than Danny's realized. The file probably gathered dust for a decade, entirely forgotten, until American troops started getting bitten in Afghanistan.

Christ, Danny thinks, this whole story would make such an amazing movie. What with the spies and the werewolves, all it lacks is a female love interest. Maybe Joan Alexander's character could fall in love with one of her patients. Her photo on the Walter Reed website shows her to be middle-aged, but Danny's sure the producers would cast some hot starlet.

He gets back on track. "This drug, then: it's not a cure, but some kind of suppressive therapy? You take the pills every month, and you don't change." Eyebrow raise.

"Okay, so," Danny goes on, "I just can't figure out how lycanthropy works. Is it a purely physical disease, transmitted like a virus?"

Steve shrugs, and Danny tries again.

"Or is there some magical mystical shit going on here?"

Another shrug.

"You don't know? How can you not know?" Danny asks, shocked. God, if this had happened to him, he'd have looked high and low for answers.

Steve breaks his silence. "The DoD shares highly classified information with personnel on a strictly 'need to know' basis." He sounds like he's reciting from a goddamn textbook.

"You need to know," Danny says loudly. "It's your body; fuck, it's your life!"

"It's not that bad, Danny," Steve argues. "Yes, the transformation was nasty, but that was four years ago and it hasn't happened since. And sure, it's an incurable condition, but it probably won't kill me. I do dangerous things every day –"

"Yeah, tell me about it," Danny can't help interjecting. "I have to watch you risk your life, and then I get to do all the paperwork afterwards."

Steve rolls his eyes. "I thought we were focusing on my problems right now?"

"Oh, so you admit that you have a problem – that's a first." Danny knows he's pushing it, but he's frustrated by Steve's attitude.

"No, actually; I'm trying to tell you that it's not a problem. I take the pills every lunar cycle, I go to D.C. once a year for a full check-up, and otherwise I try to forget about it."

Danny's leaning forward, about to keep arguing, when Steve holds up a hand and says, "Hey, stop. Just listen for a minute, all right? Maybe this isn't something you can understand, but you owe it to me to try." So Danny sits back, and gestures for him to go on.

"You've got Grace, and you're real close to your family back in Jersey. Until recently, I had nothing in my life except the military. Mom was gone, Dad and I hardly talked, and I hadn't seen my sister for years. Hell, I pretty much only got to see my girlfriend when the Navy stationed us in the same place at the same time."

Biting his tongue at the mention of Cath, Danny nods.

Steve's voice is quieter now, but still intense. "Being a SEAL, then becoming a Commander and leading a team on missions, it was...all-consuming. I had to repress all the emotional stuff, and stay strong for my guys; I had to keep going. So I categorized this as a thing I needed to deal with, one week in four, and just put it out of my mind the rest of the time."

As he processes all that, Danny realizes something interesting. Steve talks about being a werewolf the way Rachel used to talk about getting her period: a monthly annoyance that was nevertheless a fundamental part of her physiology. Danny considers pointing out the similarity, but decides against it.

"Right, I think I see," Danny says. "And now that you're a civilian, or at least spending all your time among civilians, has anything changed?"

Steve studies Danny for a long moment, his expression unreadable. "I'm still subject to the DoD's rules," he says, "whether I agree with them or not. So I'm not allowed to tell anyone – and you can't either. Promise me, Danny."

Danny looks Steve straight in the eye, and raises his right hand. "I swear, on my daughter's life: I won't tell anybody about you being a werewolf."

"I believe you, but I need more from you than that," Steve says, his tone urgent. "You have to watch how you act; you can't treat me any differently. The brass want this kept under wraps, and I'm afraid of what would happen if they even suspected you knew. We could both be in seriously deep shit here, Danny."

"You'd be surprised at how well I can fake normal," Danny says. "Take this week, for example. Did you realize that I knew?"

"No," Steve admits. "When I saw you'd changed my sheets Saturday night, I thought you might have seen the pills. But when you didn't say anything, or act weird, I figured you'd bought the silver allergy story and that my luck had held. To be honest, I didn't believe that you could keep quiet when something major was bugging you. It wasn't 'til this morning that I started to worry."

Danny smirks. "See? If you can't tell when I'm keeping a secret, then I doubt anyone else could. It'll be fine, Steve, really. Trust me."

Steve sits back in his chair, clearly not totally convinced but happier than he'd been. He stretches, looking up at the sky. The sun has set and the moon is rising, a silvery-pale sliver that seems to transfix Steve.

Following Steve's gaze, Danny asks, "Do you hate it now?" He thinks he'll never look at the moon the same way again.

"Not hate, exactly," Steve says slowly, "but I'm so much more aware of the lunar cycle than I used to be. My senses are stronger around the time of the full moon. And I can feel it getting closer, like an itch under my skin. The guys in the hospital with me used to joke about PMS – pre-moon syndrome."

"Did you have a support group or something?" Danny is fascinated at the thought.

"Yeah, kind of. The team of doctors and scientists overseeing us had a couple of shrinks on hand, too. They helped us to adjust, and prepare for the future."

"You know," Danny says, fake-casual, "I came up with a few other theories about you. For a while there, I thought you must be part of some medical experiment to create super soldiers."

Steve freezes for a moment, then shakes his head and laughs. "Uh-huh. And you decided that this was more plausible?"

Danny stands, and picks up their beer bottles. "Time for another round," he declares. "And hey, what can I say? When it comes to movies, I've always preferred supernatural stuff to science fiction."

But what he thinks as he's walking away from Steve is: fuck. The Pentagon really is doing this on purpose.

He already suspected it, but that reaction of Steve's just makes Danny even more convinced. With the help of the suppressive therapy, the armed forces can now deploy a bunch of strong, fast fighters with advanced healing and heightened senses. And as long as 'Operation Enduring Freedom' continues in Afghanistan, the number of American werewolves will only grow.

Danny dumps the empty bottles in the trash, and leans against the kitchen counter as he thinks this through.

The Pentagon can get at least some of the super soldiers it wants just by letting nature take its course, every 29 days. If troops serving in Afghanistan are being sent out on moonlit nights, without being warned of the danger and without silver weapons to protect them, then a few will inevitably get bitten. Shit...how many servicemen have died from werewolf-induced injuries, without their loved ones ever knowing what happened?

Those lucky enough to survive an attack, like Steve, are apparently left alone to change the following month. If it was bad enough to make a tough as nails SEAL cry at the memory, it must have been pretty fucking bad. Standing in Steve's empty house, Danny's hands clench into fists at the thought of his partner suffering like that.

Maybe that initial transformation is necessary to confirm the diagnosis. But maybe it's designed to show those poor bastards what the future holds, if they don't get those pills on a regular basis. And while the Pentagon's promise of lifelong medical care for personnel should hypothetically apply to them too, the werewolves sure wouldn't want to risk their supply of '2912' by causing any kind of trouble.

Danny can think of other motives for the affected men to stay in uniform. Civilian life might seem too boring for someone with superpowers – or too risky. He remembers that Army Ranger who killed himself. Was the guy ashamed of what he'd become, or was he afraid of hurting his family?

And if you believe that the military is passively allowing troops to become infected, then it doesn't seem all that far-fetched to imagine that it could be done deliberately. Danny pictures a lab, someplace like Walter Reed, where doctors inject selected personnel with the werewolf virus. The test subjects would be supplied with treatment immediately, of course, so they'd never have to experience the appalling downside of their new abilities.

He will probably never find out anything more about the Pentagon's use – or abuse – of lycanthropy. Steve might not know for sure what's going on; if he does, he won't tell. He still seems to have incredible loyalty to the organization that firstly exposed him to a vicious attack, and then condemned him to a life of secrecy.

***

Danny pushes all werewolf-related thoughts to the back of his mind, and prepares for the next step in his plan. First, he goes into the bathroom to splash cold water on his face. He can't give in to his tiredness yet – not with another difficult conversation still to come. On his way outside, Danny grabs two beers and turns on the backyard lights. More alcohol will definitely help with this, and it's important that he be able to make out Steve's reactions.

Steve's gazing at the moon meditatively, but snaps out of it when Danny approaches. Sitting down, Danny passes Steve a beer and drinks most of his in one go.

"Listen, Steve," he says, "you've told me your big secret. Or, well, I told you and you neither confirmed nor denied. So I figure it's only fair to give you one of my secrets in exchange."

Steve nods, and waits silently.

Danny's thought about this for months, weighing up whether to tell Steve and how to do it. It's been so many years since he had this conversation that he's out of practice.

But he's always favored the direct approach. So Danny takes a deep breath and says, "I'm bisexual."

Steve stares at him, eyes wide, lips parted. "Okay," he says eventually. "Huh. I did not expect that."

"What, you think I expected my partner to be a mythological creature?" Danny shoots back, and Steve makes a 'touché' gesture with his bottle.

"I take it you're not exactly out," Steve ventures, and Danny shakes his head.

"Cops aren't always the most open-minded people around. Plus, you know, my family's Catholic. It was tough, growing up." That's all he can say; his inexhaustible supply of words runs out when it comes to this.

"Yeah," Steve says, his expression sympathetic. He was a cop's son in the 80s and joined the military in the 90s, so it could be that he's witnessed enough homophobia to fill in the blanks. Or maybe Steve's queer too...maybe he knows exactly how it feels, having to suppress an integral part of your identity to comply with your community's rules.

Danny desperately wants to ask him, point blank, but he can't. He's pushed the boundaries of their friendship far enough already.

"I dated guys when I went away to college, but once I came back to Jersey and entered the police academy it was pretty much women only. Then I met Rachel, so –" he shrugs, and takes another swig of beer.

"And after the divorce?"

"Some one night stands," Danny admits. "Nothing serious, though. Hawaii's more tolerant than home, I guess, but it's still hard to be open about this. You're the first person I've told, here. Actually, you're the first person I've told since Rachel, and that was a decade ago."

"Thank you," Steve says, his voice low. "I'm honored."

"Like I said," Danny replies, "I trust you more than anyone."

Danny had hoped that Steve might reciprocate with a confession of his own. He's been fixated on the werewolf stuff, sure, but he hasn't forgotten that other unexpected discovery from last weekend: Steve, moaning Danny's name during what looked like a sex dream.

So he had an ulterior motive for coming out to Steve tonight. It wasn't just about demonstrating his faith in their friendship, or establishing a basis for mutually assured destruction. Danny wanted to signal that Steve could be open about his own sexuality, if he wanted.

But Steve doesn't say anything else. He just looks pensive – and exhausted. For a guy who's so averse to talking about his feelings, tonight must have been intensely uncomfortable. Under the circumstances, then, quiet acceptance is probably the most that Danny could reasonably expect.

"I should go," Danny finally says. "I've got Grace this weekend, so I'll be picking her up early in the morning."

"Okay," Steve says. They head into the house, where Danny collects his gun, and Steve walks him out to the car.

"I'll see you Monday, I guess." Steve's tone sounds kind of...bleak, like he has nothing to look forward to between now and then.

Danny wants to make an immediate start on proving to him that nothing's changed. So he asks, "Hey, if it's cool with you, could Grace and I come by tomorrow afternoon? She likes swimming here, and I like her swimming here too – there are no surfers or big waves or boys, for a start. Plus, you make better burgers than those rip-off joints at the tourist beaches."

"Yeah," Steve says, laughing a little. "That'd be great."

It's been an evening of taking risks, so Danny decides to take another. He reaches out and clasps Steve's upper arm, just inches from the bullet graze that started all this. Steve's muscles tense under the touch and he inhales sharply, making Danny fear he's gone too far. Steve doesn't draw back, though. Instead, he reaches out with his other hand and pulls Danny into a hug.

It's the first embrace they've shared since they met. Stunned, and self-conscious about possibly enjoying the proximity too much, Danny can't fully relax into it. But he commits to memory the feeling of Steve's body against his: soft cotton T-shirt under his cheek, steady heartbeat in his ear, and smooth tattoo under his fingertips. Steve's hands are pressed against Danny's back, so much heat soaking through the thin fabric of his shirt that they might as well be skin to skin.

All too soon, Steve claps him on the shoulder and lets him go. "Thanks, Danno," he says, walking towards the house.

"'Night," Danny calls after Steve, not feeling up to the challenge of stringing together multiple words. He gets into the car and sits there until his body calms down, then starts the engine.

He drives home feeling shell-shocked, but satisfied. Both the werewolf confrontation and the coming-out conversation could have been pretty catastrophic. Even Danny's tentative gesture of support, the hand on Steve's arm, might have gone wrong if Steve took it as an unwelcome come-on.

Somehow, though, he and Steve got through it all intact. Danny's confident that the hardest part is behind them, now, and that their friendship will be stronger than ever.

***

Chapter Text

After Danny's intense conversation with Steve that November night, things mostly go back to usual. Mindful of Steve's dire warnings, Danny makes a point of treating his partner just the same as ever over the next few weeks: criticizing his crazy stunts and disdain for police procedure, complaining about his driving, and mocking his choice of pizza toppings. But he still backs Steve 100% when it matters, and hangs out with him as much as before.

Steve, on the other hand, does change his behavior. He stands closer to Danny, even when they're arguing, and initiates way more physical contact. Steve touches Danny's wrist to get his attention, claps him on the shoulder to congratulate him on a breakthrough, and cups the back of his neck after a particularly awful case.

In a normal person, Danny would read all that as flirtation. Steve is far from normal, though, and fuck knows what might be happening in his head. Danny could ask, but he's afraid of revealing his own feelings by doing so. If Steve hasn't guessed yet, then he's not about to tell. They've reached a new, deeper level of friendship, and Danny needs some time to adjust before even considering the next step.

The moon moves through its cycle, like always. When it gets to the three-quarter stage, Danny watches Steve closely. Now that he knows what to look for, the itch under Steve's skin is obvious. He's tense and irritable; he minimizes his social interaction outside of work; and he goes for long, punishing runs and swims.

But when Danny picks Steve up the morning after the full moon, he looks tired but fundamentally okay. Danny silently blesses those Russian scientists who developed 'Formula 2912'. Thanks to their efforts, Steve is saved from a terrible monthly ordeal.

***

It's a Friday night, six weeks after their mutual coming out, and the two of them are having dinner at an expensive Honolulu restaurant. Steve had wanted to go there, saying he had a craving for their famous seafood platter, and cajoled Danny into coming by promising to buy him whatever he wanted.

After making Steve pull out his credit card as proof of intent, Danny takes him up on the offer. He orders surf 'n' turf, which includes a huge steak cooked to perfection, followed by the most incredible tiramisu he's ever eaten. When Danny admits that even his favorite Italian place in Jersey couldn't have done better, Steve's smile is bright and beautiful.

It's pouring down by the time they finish eating, so they hurry across the poorly-lit parking lot behind the restaurant. And then a man appears from between two parked SUVs and shoots Steve.

It happens so fast that Danny feels dizzy. He has his own weapon in hand a second later, muscle memory overriding shock, but he's momentarily blinded by the muzzle flash. By the time Danny's vision is clear, the perp is already running like hell. Firing at a moving target on a dark night, in an urban area, would risk disastrous collateral damage. Anyway, the shooter is not his first priority.

Steve has fallen to the ground and is just lying there, silent and still.

Danny holsters his gun and drops to his knees, yelling for someone to call 911. Steve is alive and conscious, thank God, blinking up at the sky as raindrops spatter his skin.

Ripping open Steve's shirt, Danny finds blood streaming out of the bullet hole in his chest. Fuck, this looks bad. He immediately pulls off his own shirt to stanch the flow; the sight of Steve's blood soaking into the white fabric is sickeningly vivid. There's another pool of blood spreading from underneath Steve's head. Danny prays that it's from a simple scalp laceration and not a sign of something worse.

Danny wants to swear, or cry, but recalls from his first aid training that keeping the patient calm is essential. So he murmurs reassuring nonsense to Steve while trying to assess his condition.

He knows he shouldn't roll Steve over, in case there are spinal injuries. Instead, Danny carefully slides one hand under Steve's back to search for an exit wound. There's none that he can feel, meaning the bullet is still in his body.

The blood bubbling out of the chest wound and Steve's increasingly labored breathing suggest lung damage, at the very least. The entry wound is on Steve's right side, between his nipple and sternum, but there's a chance that the bullet has ricocheted off bone and lodged in his heart. If that's true, then Steve could bleed to death right here.

One of the restaurant's waiters runs across the parking lot to tell Danny that the paramedics and police are on their way. Danny orders him to go find clean towels, plastic wrap, and some kind of adhesive tape. When the guy returns with the supplies, Danny fashions a makeshift dressing and applies it to Steve's chest, holding it in place with a wadded-up towel.

Steve's coughing and gasping for air now. Even if he wasn't the most stoic man on the planet, he probably wouldn't have the lung capacity to scream in pain.

He lifts one shaking hand to touch Danny's arm, and mumbles, "S'rry."

"Hey, no – don't say that. You're gonna be fine, babe. Don't talk; just stay with me." Danny can't take Steve's hand because he has to maintain pressure on the bandage, but he bends lower over Steve's face. "I got you, okay?"

"I shoulda b'n braver," Steve whispers breathlessly, like he didn't hear any of that. His lips are blood-flecked and his eyes are unfocused, though Danny's just inches above him. Shit, he's fading away.

Danny hears the welcome sound of approaching sirens.

"What are you talking about? You're the bravest person I know! I think the only guy braver than you is Rambo. And he's in the fucking Army, right? So obviously you gotta be braver than him, just on general principle..." Danny keeps talking, saying anything that comes to mind, trying to keep Steve awake.

But Steve's eyes slowly close, and his hand falls away.

***

Danny's mind is playing tricks on him. Everything since the gunshot has been on fast-forward. Now that Steve's lost consciousness, time has slowed to a crawl.

Though the ambulance gets there a minute later, Danny wants to scream abuse at the driver for taking too long. All of Oahu's paramedics know Steve and Danny by now, so they don't even try to stop him riding along. Wet and shivering under a blanket, half-naked since his shirt is a blood-soaked ruin, Danny watches helplessly as the paramedics work to keep Steve alive.

They're not too far from Honolulu's main hospital, thankfully, and Steve is rushed into the OR as soon as they arrive. Danny is left standing in a corridor, feeling the world tilt around him.

Danny answers questions in a daze, and fills out forms as best he can. An orderly finds an old oversized t-shirt for him to wear; it smells of disinfectant, but at least it helps keep him warm. Time goes elastic again as Danny paces around the ER waiting area.

He doesn't remember calling his teammates and the Governor. Someone must have, though, because they all show up. Chin looks calm, like always, but his fists are clenched. Kono hugs Danny tightly, and he can feel her body trembling. Governor Jameson must have been at a formal function when she got the news, because she sweeps in wearing a glittering dress and a 'don't fuck with me' expression.

Danny tells them what happened, but there's frustratingly little to go on. The parking lot was pretty dark, so he just saw the outline of the shooter's body and not his face. The guy was about 5'10", average build, dressed in black and wearing a dark-colored baseball cap. It could be almost anyone, from that description. Hell, it might have been a woman for all Danny knows.

The weapon was definitely a handgun, though – probably a semi-automatic, since Danny thinks he heard a shell casing hit the ground. He hopes the CSU techs have retrieved it.

The perp hadn't said a word, no threats or accusations, but it seems likely that he was aiming for Steve. Danny was in his usual white shirt while Steve's was navy blue, so Danny would've made a much clearer target if the asshole just wanted to shoot someone indiscriminately.

There are many people who want Steve dead, including international terrorists and organized crime bosses. Victor Hesse could have arranged a hit from jail, and then there's Hiro Noshimuri who Steve arrested a couple of weeks ago. If Noshimuri himself isn't seeking revenge, maybe whoever's taken over the local yakuza decided to make a splash.

With Steve down, Danny is head of Five-0. Since he can't bear to leave the hospital, he delegates.

"Guys, listen. I know it's rough, but I need you to go work with HPD on this."

Kono clearly wants to stay here; she bites her lip, though, and nods. Her cousin looks grimly determined, and Danny's aware that this could be hard for him. Chin hasn't had to take point on a joint investigation before.

The Governor knows Chin's history, and she picks up on his tension. "If your old colleagues give you any trouble, let me know. I will set a fire under their collective asses, believe you me."

Chin hasn't dealt directly with the Governor before, so he's not used to her plain speaking approach. He blinks at her, and says, "Yes, ma'am."

Governor Jameson checks her watch and says, "I'm so sorry, but I have to get back to the charity gala. I wish you luck in hunting down this bastard; you have my full backing." She clasps Danny's shoulder briefly, then leaves.

"One more thing," Danny says. "The shooter could have been a random maniac, or a professional assassin. We just don't know. But if he finds out that Steve survived and will recover" – power of positive thinking, Danny tells himself – "he might try again. So ask HPD to set a constant guard on Steve, starting immediately."

Nodding, Chin immediately gets out his phone to arrange it. Kono takes Danny's hand and places a St. Michael medal, his graduation gift to her, in his palm.

"I thought you could use a double dose of protection," she says.

It's a small act of kindness that almost makes Danny break down, when so far he's held it together. But he blinks back the tears, because there's a long way to go yet. He pulls Kono close, resting his head on her shoulder, and whispers, "Thank you."

Chin finishes his call, and heads off with Kono to the crime scene. It's hard for Danny to think of the restaurant like that, after he and Steve had such a great evening there. Steve was happy and relaxed, thanks in part to him drinking more than usual. And something about the way he looked at Danny suggested that yeah, maybe it was time to consider the next step.

Now Danny's waiting to hear if Steve will survive the night.

He shouldn't be as worried as the others are. Unlike them, Danny knows that Steve is more resilient than any standard-issue human and can heal faster too. There had been no acrid smoke coming off the wound, which means the bullet wasn't silver. So he's got good cause to believe that Steve will be okay, despite suffering such serious physical trauma.

But if (when) Steve pulls through, there'll be other reasons to worry. What if lycanthropy shows up in his blood tests, somehow? And what if he recovers so rapidly that the doctors get suspicious? Bullshitting about a fast metabolism resulting in fast healing had fooled Danny, but it might not work on people with medical training.

Maybe Danny should notify one of the military hospitals on the island, and get Steve transferred. He isn't sure whether the medics there would know about this stuff, though, and he'd sworn on Gracie's life never to reveal Steve's secret.

Steve goes to Walter Reed in D.C. for his annual check-up, so maybe Danny should call Dr. Alexander instead. But what can he say to her? He's not supposed to know that werewolves exist, and Steve had feared nasty consequences for them both if anyone in the military even suspected that Danny had learned the truth. Anyway...what could the Army specialists do for Steve right now that the Hawaiian doctors can't?

So Danny waits, and worries, and prays.

***

Sometime later, one of his favorite nurses approaches with a clipboard in her hand and a sympathetic look on her face. Leilani knows Danny from his many previous hospital visits, both as a patient and as the frustrated guy telling Steve to sit the hell down and let the ER staff patch him up.

She's high up on Danny's top ten list, cheerful and caring as well as stunningly hot, and usually he'd do a little friendly flirting. This time, Danny can't even muster up a smile for her.

"Sorry to bug you again, Detective," she says, "but you've put on this form that Commander McGarrett isn't taking any regular medication. Are you sure about that?"

God, Danny hates lying to people he likes and respects: first Kumiko, then Chin, and now Leilani. There's no alternative, though. Not if he wants to protect Steve.

"Pretty sure," Danny claims. "I looked in his bathroom cabinet when I was over there last weekend and needed something for my headache. I didn't notice any prescription drugs."

Leilani raises one eyebrow at him; like cops, ER staff must develop an effective bullshit detector. She doesn't call him on it, though.

"Okay," she says. "Can you please go to his place and double-check? If he is taking anything, we need to know as soon as possible."

Danny is reluctant to leave the hospital while Steve's in surgery, but Leilani tells him that it could take several more hours. And there are now two HPD officers stationed outside the OR, guys that Danny knows and has a reasonable level of faith in.

His car is still in the restaurant parking lot, so Danny gets a cab over to Steve's house and lets himself in. He looks in all the obvious places but finds no prescription bottles, and no over-the-counter drugs apart from standard painkillers.

Some interesting things do turn up when Danny checks the bedside table, though. The silicone lube and extra strong condoms in the top drawer might or might not mean anything about Steve's sexual preferences. It's actually reassuring to know that despite all his reckless behavior in other regards, Steve plays it safe in the bedroom.

But Steve's collection of visual aids is far more revealing. On top of the pile is a gay porn magazine, and on the cover is a blond blue-eyed man who kinda looks like Danny.

Feeling light-headed, Danny sits down on the edge of the bed and stares at the magazine. He wants to pick it up, and test whether it falls open to the blond man's photo spread; he wants to go through the magazines to see if they're all gay porn, or if there are also some featuring naked women.

Instead, he shuts the drawer. Looking in there was justifiable as part of a search carried out under medical orders, but he can't invade Steve's privacy any further. Anyway, he knows enough now.

Danny heads back to the hospital and reports the apparent lack of medication to Leilani, then gets a cup of so-called coffee from the vending machine and steels himself for yet more waiting. He calls Kono, to tell her that there's been no news and to get an update on the investigation.

Chin is still at the scene, interviewing people, but so far it seems like there were no witnesses to the shooting. The restaurant's interior was too brightly-lit for diners to see much outside, the rain was so heavy that nobody was lingering in the parking lot, and none of the kitchen staff were taking a cigarette break out back at that crucial moment.

And Kono has more bad news: although there's a security camera mounted on the restaurant's exterior wall, it's been broken for weeks. Danny grinds his teeth, and mentally schedules a not-so-polite conversation with the place's owner about that and about the poor lighting out in the lot. If they'd seen the gunman in advance, Steve would've had a much better chance of defending himself.

There are surveillance cameras covering the surrounding streets, however, and Kono's about to start reviewing the footage with HPD's tech guys. She promises to let Danny know if they get any decent leads.

"Have you called Steve's sister?" Kono asks, and shit – no, he hasn't.

"I don't have her number," Danny says. "I need Steve's phone."

Danny stops Leilani the next time she walks past, and asks her to find out what happened to the clothes Steve was wearing. Ten minutes later, she comes back with Steve's bloodstained clothes in a large plastic evidence bag and his personal belongings in a smaller one. The phone is intact and clean, luckily, so Danny makes the call.

Mary had flown back to the mainland only two weeks ago. California is several hours ahead of Hawaii, so her voice is thick with sleep when she picks up. "Steve?"

"Mary, this is Danny Williams," he says.

"Oh, shit – what's happened?" Suddenly she sounds wide awake.

"Steve's been shot and he's in surgery," he tells her. "It's serious, but I'm hopeful that he'll pull through."

"Do you know who did it?"

"Not yet," Danny admits, "but we're doing our best."

"God, I wish I could fly out there," Mary says, her tone frustrated. "But I just started a new job, and I can't risk losing it."

"I swear, Mary, you'll be the first person I call once I know more. You're safer in LA than here, so I think Steve would want you to stay put."

After he finishes talking to Mary, Danny enters her number into his own phone. Then he scrolls through Steve's contact list in case there's anyone else he should notify.

When he gets to Catherine, he pauses. Danny doesn't know where in the world she is, but he doubts she could just leave her aircraft carrier and fly to Steve's bedside. So there's probably no point in calling her right now, and worrying her unnecessarily. He'll get in touch once there's some definite news.

A few entries down, he sees his own name and face. Steve must have snapped the photo without Danny's knowledge, because he's looking off to the side instead of at the camera. Danny is willing to bet he was gazing at Grace at the time, because his expression is soft, happy, and full of love.

It's strange to see himself this way, and it's even stranger that Steve would choose this image to represent a friend and colleague. Danny can only think of one explanation: that Steve wants Danny to look at him like that.

Once Steve wakes up, the two of them are going to have a good long talk.

***

When a tired-looking man in scrubs walks across the waiting room, an eternity later, Danny stands up and clutches Kono's St. Michael medal so tight that it hurts his palm.

"The surgery was successful, and Commander McGarrett has been moved to the ICU," the surgeon tells him, and Danny exhales. "The bullet broke two ribs, collapsed his right lung, and caused serious internal bleeding. He's otherwise fit and healthy, so he's likely to recover. There was no skull fracture, but he has suffered a concussion. We won't know for certain if there was any lasting neurological damage until he regains consciousness."

Now that the agonizing wait for news is over, Danny abruptly feels the full weight of his physical and mental exhaustion. He forces himself to focus.

"Thank you so much, doctor. Were you able to retrieve the bullet?"

"Yes," the surgeon says. He hands over a small evidence bag containing a hollow-point round, which Danny thinks might have been a 9mm. The tip has mushroomed, but the base looks intact enough for CSU to get some ballistic data off it.

"Great, that should be very useful for our investigation," Danny says. "Can I see him now, please?"

"He's heavily sedated, but you can sit with him."

After calling Mary, Chin and Kono to update them, Danny heads upstairs. He's spent a lot of time in this ICU, interviewing patients. But now that the person in critical condition is someone he truly cares for, Danny looks at all the high-tech medical intervention through new eyes.

Danny's used to Steve being in motion; even when still, the guy seems ready to spring into action in a split second. So it seems utterly unnatural for him to be lying unconscious in a hospital bed, deathly pale and hooked up to machines.

Pulling a chair closer to the bed, Danny stares silently for a while. Steve's torso is bare, the right half of his chest bandaged with a drainage tube sticking out the side. There's a breathing tube down his throat, an IV line in his right hand, and wires and sensors everywhere.

It's a heartbreaking sight.

The back of Steve's head is bandaged too, thanks to his six-foot fall onto unforgiving asphalt. Danny can't bear to contemplate what the impact may have done to Steve's brain, so he just focuses on the beloved face before him.

"Hey, partner," he murmurs. "You're not looking so good, huh? God, I can't believe your bad luck. You survived a whole string of war zones and moved to the suburbs of this so-called paradise, and people are still trying to kill you on a regular basis. I myself feel mildly homicidal towards you at least once a week, don't get me wrong, but –"

Danny's weak attempt at humor dries up, and raw emotion bleeds through. "You can't do this to me, Steve," he says, leaning forward. "Things are so good between us, now, and I'm pretty sure we both want more. We just need the time to work it out. So please, hold on."

The only part of Steve that he can safely touch is his left arm. Danny bows his head and rests it against the warm skin of Steve's wrist.

"Please," he whispers.

***

Steve spends the next few days intubated and sedated.

Danny spends most of that time by his side. He naps fitfully – first in a chair, and then on a cot set up in the corner of Steve's room. The ICU nurses offer him some sleeping pills, but Danny doesn't want to risk missing anything. Despite the two cops on guard outside, there's still a chance the shooter could sneak in. And Danny hates the thought of Steve waking up without a familiar face there to comfort him.

CSU does a rush job on the bullet and shell casing. When Kono comes by on Saturday morning, she reports that Danny was right: the round was fired from a 9mm semi-automatic, probably a Glock. The ballistic data doesn't match anything on file, in Hawaii or on the mainland. So it's likely that the gun was new, or had never been used in a crime before.

The crime scene interviews didn't provide anything helpful, but Chin's tracked down diners who'd been at the restaurant prior to the shooting. Thanks to the bad weather, most people were too focused on getting into the building or into their vehicle to notice anything unusual.

Finally, though, Chin gets a break. An elderly couple report seeing a man dressed in black loitering in the far corner of the lot as they walked to their car, but it was too dark for them to make out his features.

That was maybe half an hour before Steve and Danny left the restaurant, pretty much confirming Danny's fear that Steve was specifically targeted. If the perp just wanted to shoot someone at random, why wait so long in the rain while other potential victims – almost certainly unarmed – came and went? Still, it could be a serial killer with a very definite type, or a psycho who picked out Steve for some reason known only to himself.

None of these possibilities help Danny to sleep any easier.

There was nothing useful from the surveillance cameras in the immediate vicinity, which in itself is quite telling. The perp apparently jumped the fence behind the restaurant, something only a tall athletic person could have managed, then cut through the lots of several adjacent buildings and entered a network of alleyways. From there, he could have gone in any direction; it'll take many hours of work for HPD to check all the cameras in the wider area, and the guy could easily had a change of clothes or a vehicle stashed in one of the alleys. So he either knew the district very well, or had done recon in advance.

"I'm still not convinced that the shooter was a pro," Danny says to Chin Saturday night, as they watch the ventilator breathe for Steve. Visiting hours are long over, but Danny's habit of always being friendly to hospital staff is paying off now; the ICU nurses let Chin in.

Chin cocks an eyebrow at him. "Why not? He managed to inflict a life-threatening wound on a moving target, with a handgun, from at least 15 feet away. That's impressive, given the ambient conditions at the time."

"Yeah, okay, he's clearly got some skills. But I've seen my share of Mob hits, back in Jersey," Danny explains. "An assassin would most likely go for a double tap, with the second shot either center mass or to the head. And he'd be fast, confident of putting Steve down before either of us even had the chance to react. He wouldn't just fire once, and then run off without seeing how badly Steve was hurt!"

"Right, I see what you mean. And doing it in a public place, with potential witnesses and without a silencer, seems either incredibly brazen or stupidly sloppy," Chin agrees. "Not to mention the risk of ambushing an armed, highly trained soldier with an armed, highly experienced cop right beside him. A professional would have either taken you both out from a safe distance, using a more accurate weapon, or waited to get Steve alone."

"So someone with firearms experience, but more bravado than actual kills to his name. That probably rules out law enforcement or military," Danny says. He'd hate to be dealing with another of Steve's old comrades; Nick Taylor was bad enough.

"It could be an ambitious lowlife, trying to rise up through the ranks," Chin suggests. "Taking out the head of Five-0 would give him great bragging rights."

"Yeah, maybe. If he wasn't working for Hesse or Noshimuri, he could have been trying to impress another major player on the island who fears we're coming for him next. Okay, so that's one scenario," Danny says. "But we shouldn't rule out the possibility that it might be more personal. Maybe someone connected to a local perp Steve took down is out for revenge?"

"I'll go through our old files and see if anything pops," Chin says. "I'll also check with some of my former C.I.s, in case anyone's been talking about a planned hit on Steve."

Chin leaves, and Danny prepares for another restless night. But he's so tired that he actually manages a few hours' sleep. The regular sounds of the machines and monitors are surprisingly soothing, telling Danny that Steve's alive and safe and just a few feet away.

He wasn't due to have Grace this weekend; for once, Danny's glad of that fact. But he calls Rachel on Sunday morning to tell her what's happened. Steve had made a good impression on her during that triathlon case, and she expresses sympathy. Danny remembers Rachel's constant fear, during their marriage, that he would be killed or severely injured on the job. Now he understands her perspective a little better.

Rachel puts Grace on the phone, because Danny desperately needs to hear her sweet voice. He lets his daughter's chatter about a friend's birthday party wash over him, like a balm for his aching heart. Then he explains as best he can that Uncle Steve is hurt and needs Danny to look after him. Grace tells Danny to give Steve a hug for her. He swallows hard, and promises that he will.

Steve is still unconscious that afternoon, so Danny asks Kono to come sit with him and then takes a cab to go pick up his car. The weekend's thunderstorms have washed away Steve's blood from the restaurant's parking lot, and Danny has a moment of irrational fury: something so important should leave an indelible mark.

But he gets in the car, and drives home for a much-needed shower and shave. Wearing clean clothes, and with more packed into an overnight bag, Danny returns to the hospital two hours later to resume his vigil.

***

Steve wakes up just before noon on Monday. First his fingertips twitch, then his eyelids flicker.

Danny's sitting beside him, drinking his second coffee of the morning. It tastes terrible, but it's hot and strong enough to get the job done. When he sees Steve move, Danny stands up and leans over him.

"Hey, partner," he breathes.

Steve's eyes open wide, and the cardiac monitor picks up. Fearing that he'll panic and do himself more damage, Danny quickly says, "Don't move, okay? You're in the ICU, but you're going to be fine."

All the machines start beeping like crazy, and Danny presses the emergency call button on the wall. "You gotta stay calm, Steve, please."

A doctor and two nurses rush in, and Danny moves back to let them work. After checking Steve over, Dr. Young tells him that he's undergone surgery for a gunshot wound to the chest and has also suffered a concussion.

She seems shocked that he's awake, and Danny gets the strong impression that Steve wasn't supposed to regain consciousness yet. Maybe his lycanthropy-enhanced metabolism means the sedatives wore off quicker than they usually would.

Steve settles down a little but still seems agitated, his eyes continually flicking over to where Danny is standing. The doctor is about to sedate him again, presumably with a stronger dose, so this could be Danny's only chance.

"Please, wait," he says. "Commander McGarrett might have vital information about the gunman, who's still at large. I have to talk to him, to see if he can give me anything. Just a few minutes, and then you can do whatever you need to do."

Dr. Young looks unhappy, but agrees. She and the nurses leave, and Danny moves back to Steve's side.

"Hey babe, I'm here. It's okay." He takes Steve's left hand, meaning to give it a reassuring squeeze, but Steve pulls out of Danny's grasp. Danny would be offended, but then he realizes that Steve is trying to communicate.

Steve makes a circle with his thumb and forefinger. Danny initially thinks it's the universal symbol for 'okay', but then Steve starts holding up his fingers: 'Two. Five. Four. One. Two.'

When Danny works out what this all means, it feels like he's the one with a hole in his chest.

The full moon. '2912'.

...shit. With everything that's happened, Danny has completely lost track of the lunar cycle. It's the rainy season, anyway, so there hasn't been a clear night for a while.

But thinking back, Danny realizes that it's been at least three weeks since the last full moon. If so, then Steve is now overdue for his monthly dose of suppressive therapy.

Danny stares at Steve, horrified. "Oh, Christ," he whispers. "Your pills."

Steve raises his eyebrows – ah, right, he's using the code they worked out for talking about lycanthropy. At least his brain seems to be functioning okay.

"You were shot on Friday, and it's Monday now," Danny tells him. "What happens if you don't take the full seven-day course? Will the drug still work?"

Steve wrinkles his nose and squeezes his eyes shut, giving Danny the answer he was dreading. The stabbing sensation in Danny's chest intensifies. He'd thought that seeing Steve get shot was bad enough, but this is a nightmare.

"Fuck, Steve, I'm so sorry," Danny says brokenly. "I should've been keeping track for you. I should've found a way to get you the pills."

Steve opens his eyes, reaches for Danny's hand, and pats it like he doesn't blame Danny. Danny sure as hell blames himself, but right now he has to keep it together.

"All right, listen. Do you want me to call the doctors at Walter Reed?"

Steve wrinkles his nose. "Do you want me to call anyone in the military?" Danny presses, to be certain, and Steve repeats the negative response.

"Okay." Danny takes a deep breath. "So if you're going to transform, you can't do it here. We've got to get you out of hospital, and into some kind of safe room."

Steve raises his eyebrows, and tears well in his eyes; Danny doesn't know if they're due to pain or fear. Then Steve tilts Danny's hand up so he can start shaping letters on the palm.

'B-A-S-E-M –'

"The basement at your house?" Danny interrupts. Steve confirms this, and Danny has to admit it's a good idea. He's been down there just once, when they used it as a hiding place for General Pak and his family. It's a decent-sized space, windowless and only accessible via that one entrance under the main staircase. But the door at the top of the steps is made of wood, and the room is full of junk.

"We'd need to make some renovations, pronto, to make sure you can't escape or get hurt," Danny says. Steve traces a dollar sign onto Danny's hand, then points at himself. Danny doesn't doubt that it will cost a fortune to have a safe room created at such short notice, and he hopes Steve's right about being able to afford it.

Danny thinks fast: how would he design a holding cell for a cunning and dangerous wild animal? He's thankful now for all those hours spent watching Animal Planet with Grace, because some of the shows followed the work of zookeepers handling big carnivores.

"We'd need a super reinforced door into the house, lockable from the outside, plus maybe a door with iron bars at the bottom of the steps. Does that sound like enough?"

Steve raises his eyebrows, then spells out 'C-C-T-V'. Hell, he wants Danny to be able to watch and hear him while he's transformed. It makes sense, but it's a horrifying thought.

"Right. How many days 'til the full moon?" Danny asks, and Steve holds up five fingers.

"Okay, so we don't have much time. I'm gonna go call some contractors now and get them started ASAP," Danny says. "I swear to you, I'll do everything I can to make this work."

Steve lifts his hand up to his chin, and then moves it away like he's blowing a kiss. Danny recognizes the gesture; it's ASL for 'thank you'.

"You're welcome," he replies softly, capturing Steve's hand again and holding it between both of his.

Danny can see the doctor standing outside Steve's room, looking impatient. "One last thing," he says. "We haven't caught the guy who shot you yet. I didn't get a good look at him, so we don't have much to go on. Do you have any idea who it was?"

Steve shrugs, wincing as the movement pulls at his dressings.

"We'll get him," Danny promises. "Just concentrate on getting better, and leave the detective work to us real cops."

Steve's eyebrow raise could mean 'sure', but Danny chooses to read it as 'you sayin' I'm not a real cop?'

Danny flashes Steve a grin, squeezes his hand once more, and says, "I'll be back later. Don't fight the ICU staff, okay – they're trying to help."

He opens the door and tells Dr. Young, "Thanks for waiting, doctor. He's all yours." Then Danny walks down the corridor without looking back.

***

Chapter Text

The first thing Danny does when he gets home Monday is call Mary, telling her that Steve woke up and doesn't seem to have suffered any serious neurological damage. He leaves a similar message for the Governor, then contacts Chin and Kono. His teammates are driving across the island to visit one of Chin's old C.I.s, but Kono says they'll stop by the hospital later.

Next, he opens his laptop and looks up the lunar cycle. As Steve had signaled, the full moon is due on Saturday night. Danny doesn't know whether the seven-day course of pills is supposed to end at the full moon, or the day before. Either way, Steve should have started taking '2912' sometime over this past weekend – and now it's too late.

But Steve was unconscious, intubated, and receiving a cocktail of intravenous drugs at the time. So Danny can't see how he possibly could have gotten the pills into his system. Just trying to do it could have killed Steve, or made his condition far worse.

Maybe it's rotten timing, rather than being Danny's fault. Still, he feels sick to his stomach. If he'd recognized the problem earlier, the looming deadline wouldn't be quite so tight.

Danny pulls out the Yellow Pages and calls a bunch of local construction firms, asking if they could do a rush job starting tomorrow. The recession has reduced demand for their services, so he finds a couple of contractors who are available and arranges to meet them at Steve's later today to provide a quote. Danny also phones a few home security companies, and runs through the same process. There's only one that can meet his deadline, so he asks a representative out to the house too.

While he's taking a quick shower to wake himself up, Danny figures out how to explain this sudden renovation project to people. By the time he's out of the bathroom, shaved and dressed, he's got his cover story sorted.

It goes like this:

Five-0 and HPD are no closer to identifying the shooter. Even if they do catch him, there's a good chance he's just a lackey working for someone else. Steve sure does have a knack of making enemies out of powerful criminals who hold grudges.

So Steve's house needs a safe room, in case of further attack – and, naturally, it'd make sense for it to double as a temporary holding cell for any captured intruders. Then there are all those bullet holes from Five-0's shoot-out with Nick Taylor's men, almost two months ago. Steve's been too busy to organize contractors, having turned down Kamekona's offer to put his brothers on the job, and never got around to doing it himself. So they might as well get that damage fixed up at the same time, while adding some extra security measures.

And Danny can truthfully say that they're having the work done immediately so that Steve can be safe once he's out of hospital. Hopefully, anyone who's curious will care more about Steve's survival than anything else.

The two contractors and the security consultant meet Danny at the house that afternoon, and he outlines the urgent need for defensive strengthening. Steve's a high profile figure in Hawaii, and Friday night's shooting made the headlines. So they all nod understandingly.

Danny describes Steve as his partner, has a key to the house, and knows the alarm code. The three men seem to assume that he and Steve are in a relationship; since that suits his purposes, Danny doesn't correct them.

They tour the house and basement, Danny explaining his requirements and the security expert adding some suggestions. One of the contractors admits he'd have to take on extra laborers to do the job, and can't guarantee that it'd be done by Friday. So Danny picks the other guy, who says his existing team is large enough to work round the clock in two shifts.

The second contractor names a scarily high price, and Danny agrees without even trying to bargain him down. This project needs to happen ASAP, and he wants workers who are highly motivated.

***

Danny returns to the ICU around sunset, and finds Chin talking to Steve.

When Chin glances up and sees him, he breaks off mid-sentence. "Hey, Danny. I was just reminding Steve about the glory days of Kukui High football."

"Oh yeah? Yours or his?"

"Both," Chin says, smiling slightly. "I figured it was only fair, seeing as he can't tell his own stories right now."

Danny pulls up the second visitor's chair and looks at Steve, who's reprising his role as Sleeping Beauty. "Has there been any change?"

Chin shakes his head, serious again. "He's been unconscious since you left. Dr. Young said he got too agitated; he'll have to stay sedated 'til he can breathe for himself."

"Yeah, that makes sense. I'd sure as hell panic if I woke up with a tube down my throat." Danny pats Steve's arm consolingly, in case he can hear them, before turning to Chin. "Where are we at with the investigation?"

"Not much to report, sorry. Kono's gone over to liaise with HPD, and see if anything's been found in the alleyways. And none of my contacts have reported any talk about an assassination attempt on Steve."

"So our theory about a low-level scumbag with big dreams might be off," Danny says. "Why take such an insane risk for the bragging rights, if you keep your mouth shut after?"

"Exactly," Chin says. "It's looking more like the gunman is a lone wolf" – Danny does his best not to flinch – "or part of some organization that's good at keeping secrets. But I'll go talk to a few more people tonight, just in case."

Chin stops, and looks at Danny's shirt quizzically. There are smears of dust on the sleeves from poking around in Steve's basement. "You've been busy too, huh?"

Danny lays out the renovation story for Chin, doing his best not to show any of the standard signs of deceit. It's hard enough to lie to a friend; lying to an experienced detective is even worse.

"Steve asked you to do all that?" Chin raises one eyebrow. "I get the why, but: how, exactly?"

"It took effort, believe me," Danny says. "We both know some sign language, luckily. Also, we worked out our own system of non-verbal facial cues a while back. You know what it's like on an all-night stakeout...you'll do just about anything to pass the time!"

Chin nods, obviously very familiar with the mind-numbing tedium Danny's referring to.

"I can see how it'd help to have a practical project right now," he says, and Danny gets the impression he's choosing his words carefully. "But make sure you get some rest too, okay? You'll be no good to us, or to Steve, if you keep running on empty like this."

The expression on Chin's face is sympathetic and understanding, and Kono had looked at Danny the same way on Friday night. Shit. Clearly the two of them have figured out that Danny is head-over-heels for their boss; hell, maybe they even assume that he and Steve are already together on the sly.

Even a week ago, it would have freaked Danny out to have them know something so intensely private. He's always kept his orientation a closely-guarded secret, and he's tried to repress his feelings for Steve. Thinking strategically, though, Danny realizes that this could be a positive thing. If the others assume he's half-crazed with worry over his partner, they might be more willing to excuse any odd behavior he exhibits in the lead-up to Steve's transformation.

Anyway, Danny's pretty certain he can trust Chin and Kono. They generally seem to be 'live and let live' types; he doubts they'll turn on him like some of his Jersey colleagues would have if he'd come out.

So Danny sighs, and says, "Yeah, I know. It's just hard to sleep when he's still in danger."

"I hand-picked the list of HPD officers assigned to guard duty; they're good guys, and I'm sure they'll keep Steve safe," Chin says. "So maybe you should go home tonight. It must be noisy in here, with the nurses stopping by and all these machines beeping away, and that cot can't be comfortable."

Danny nods. "My back has been sending me increasingly angry memos about it."

"Hey, my niece is a massage therapist," Chin says, "one of the best on the island. I can give her a call, see if she could fit you in today or tomorrow. My treat, yeah? But only if you promise to sleep in a real bed tonight."

He might love Steve, but right now Danny could just kiss Chin. "God, that'd be fantastic. Thanks, man."

Chin makes good on his side of the bargain immediately, setting up an appointment for 10am Tuesday and asking his niece to send him the bill. Then he points at the door with a stern expression.

For the first time since the shooting, Danny laughs. "Okay, okay – I'm going."

He normally tries not to show his affection for Steve in front of other people, but now he has the perfect excuse. So Danny squeezes his partner's limp hand, and tells him, "I gotta go now, babe, but I'll be back tomorrow. Sleep well."

Chin smiles at the two of them, no judgment or derision on his face. Danny smiles back, and leaves the room.

***

Danny doesn't go home, of course. The contractors are due to start at 8am tomorrow morning, and he has to make sure that everything's ready. So when he gets back to Steve's house, Danny heads down to the basement and looks around. If everything goes to plan, there will be a werewolf pacing around this room in five days' time.

It all feels like some fucked-up dream.

Lycanthropy had seemed so fascinating, as an abstract concept, when he was doing all that research in the wake of Taylor's attack. And even after Steve had come clean, Danny had felt sympathetic rather than fearful.

Because when it came down to it, he'd always known that Steve was potentially lethal. The guy's his closest friend, but he's also a highly-trained soldier who could kill Danny with his bare hands. So learning that some of Steve's impressive abilities were supernatural in origin, and that one moonlit night four years ago he'd had claws instead of fingernails, hadn't really made much of a difference.

Now he's faced with the horrifying reality: not only is his partner going to turn into a monster, but Danny's the sole person on this island who knows it. All the promises he made back in November are being tested to the limit. Steve is relying on Danny to keep it together, keep his secret, and keep everyone safe.

...oh, fuck. Gracie.

Danny had said that he would trust Steve with Grace on the full moon, and he'd meant it wholeheartedly at the time. But he suddenly realizes, with a sinking heart, that she's due to stay with him this coming weekend.

Normally Danny would move heaven and earth to avoid canceling on his daughter – he sees so little of her as it is. He can't leave Steve alone on Saturday night, though, and he can't risk having her in the house during the transformation. As much as Danny cares about Steve, Grace's safety has to come first.

He needs to give Rachel as much warning as possible, in case she's already made plans to go out of town. Since reception down in the basement is crappy, Danny heads up to the living room and calls her.

Danny explains the situation as best he can. "If Steve gets released from hospital before this weekend, I want to be there to look after him. But I can't do that and give Grace the attention she deserves. And if we haven't caught the shooter by then, Steve might still be a target. In that case, she'd definitely be better off with you."

"I see," Rachel says. "Would you like to swap, then? She can stay here this weekend, and you could have her next weekend and the one after."

Danny exhales, surprised that she's making this so easy. "Yeah, that'd be great. I really appreciate it, Rach."

"It'll work out quite nicely, in fact," Rachel says. "Grace is friends with Marisol, our housekeeper's daughter, and it's her birthday this Sunday. Grace will be pleased not to miss the party."

A few months ago, Danny might have made some sarcastic comment about Rachel allowing Gracie to associate with the hired help. But now, he feels too relieved and grateful to needle her. He winds up the call, thanking her again and promising to keep her updated.

Danny turns the conversation over in his mind as he goes back down to the basement. Rachel was remarkably understanding and kind, not questioning his priorities at all. Maybe it's a sign of the gradual thaw between them...or maybe Danny should add her to the list of people who assume he and Steve are together.

Unlike the others, Rachel knows for a fact that Danny is bisexual. Her open-mindedness was one of the many things he had loved about her. Even during their bitter custody disputes, she never once suggested that his sexual orientation made him an unfit parent.

With that bullet dodged, Danny focuses on the next problem. Jack McGarrett was a real pack rat, so the basement is full of stuff. There's broken furniture the old man never got around to fixing or throwing out, bags of clothes that once belonged to Steve's mom, boxes of files, and God knows what else. Steve and Mary will have to sort it out, but that's a job for some other time.

The construction crew will need to shift all this junk out of here, and there's only one logical place to put it: the garage. So Danny finds the keys to the Mercury Marquis, and carefully drives it out onto the muddy front lawn. He puts the protective cover back over the vehicle to keep the rain off. Steve may bitch at him for touching his father's precious car, but by then Danny will probably be delighted just to hear his voice.

Danny wanders around the house's silent rooms. In the kitchen sink, he finds a bowl encrusted with granola and a mug stained with coffee dregs. This place is frozen in time, waiting for the man who left on Friday morning and never came back. Danny fills the dishes with hot soapy water and leaves them to soak.

When he opens the refrigerator, Danny finds two rib eye steaks that look past their best and a bag of ready-made salad that has gone slimy. He throws it all out.

As there's nothing else in the fridge that appeals, he gets Chinese food delivered. Danny turns on the TV, and watches the news for a few depressing minutes before switching over to some cop drama. It's laughably inaccurate, but doesn't demand anything of his overtired brain.

He goes back to the kitchen to grab a frozen peppermint candy, and notices an unopened pint of cookie dough ice cream in the freezer. It's his favorite flavor, and he knows that Steve prefers plain chocolate on the rare occasions he eats dessert. So maybe Steve bought it for Danny.

Given the day he's had, Danny feels he has definitely earned a treat. He could settle down on the couch, carton and spoon in hand, and binge like some stereotypical chick flick character. Honestly, though, he just wants to sleep. It's only 9pm, but he feels stupid with exhaustion.

Since he needs to be here tomorrow to let the contractors in and give them a spare key, it makes no sense to go back to his apartment now. Danny locks up the house, and heads upstairs. He pauses in the doorway of Steve's childhood room, looking at the narrow single bed. He should crash there, like last time, but right now he needs comfort as well as rest. So he heads into the master bedroom, strips down to his boxers, and slides between the sheets of Steve's bed.

Danny closes his eyes, inhaling his partner's familiar scent. With the covers tightly wrapped around his body, he can pretend that Steve is holding him. It's the first decent night's sleep Danny's had since the shooting.

***

The construction workers show up Tuesday morning, miraculously prompt, and start making a God-awful racket and mess. Danny arranges with the crew's foreman that they'll only do the upstairs stuff during the day; hopefully, the basement is enclosed enough that the overnight work down there won't disturb the neighbors. Extra soundproofing is high up on the to-do list, anyway, because Danny can't risk anyone hearing the howls of a wolf this Saturday night.

After a while, Danny leaves them to it and heads to his massage appointment with Chin's niece. An hour later he walks out of the clinic feeling beaten to a pulp, but so much better. His mood improves further when he gets to the hospital, because Steve's breathing tube has been removed. He still has a feeding tube in his nose, a tube draining fluid from his chest, and multiple IV lines, but it's a major step in the right direction.

Steve wakes up soon after Danny arrives. He slowly turns his head to look at Danny, who is sitting in his usual chair and skim-reading the paper.

"Hey, Danno," Steve says in a hoarse whisper, and Danny grins at him. He never thought he'd be so glad to hear his partner use that childish nickname.

"Hey yourself," he says, leaning forward and laying his hand on Steve's bare arm. "How are you feeling?"

"Okay." But it sounds like every syllable hurts – his throat must be raw from the breathing tube.

"All right, listen up," Danny says. He doesn't know how much time they'll have to themselves, so he dives right in. "It's Tuesday morning. Do you remember what we discussed yesterday, about the moon?"

Steve nods, thank God; Danny could do without a repeat of that awful conversation.

"Well, I've got good news. I hired a contractor to do the renovations, and his crew started this morning. They're going to work round the clock, so I'm hopeful that it'll get done in time."

"Great," Steve says. He breaks off for a brief coughing fit. "Offer cash bonus, $500 each. Look in linen closet."

"You have an emergency stash of money in your linen closet?" Danny says incredulously. "Oh wait, I forgot who I was talking to – of course you do. Because when you're not channeling Rambo, you're Jason fucking Bourne!"

Steve rolls his eyes, and Danny says, "Yes, I know he's Army too. Fine, whatever. I'll find the money, and promise it to the laborers if they meet the deadline."

Danny pulls Steve's newly-charged phone from his pocket and gives it to him. "Okay, next thing: you should call Mary. I've been keeping her updated, but hearing from you directly would really help. She's been so worried."

He hesitates, and then says, "I wasn't sure if you'd want me to tell Catherine what happened, so I didn't. You can decide whether to call her or not."

"Okay," Steve says. His expression doesn't give any hint about the current state of things with Cath. Danny really wants to know, but he has bigger fish to fry.

"We're still looking for the shooter," Danny tells him, "but we honestly have no idea who it was. Do you remember something about Friday night that might help?"

When Steve shakes his head, Danny persists. "Did you pick up anything off the guy?"

"I drank too much," Steve admits. "Guard down, senses dulled. But he's not like me...would've smelled it."

"That's good to hear, at least." It had occurred to Danny, at some point during his weekend vigil, that another serviceman bitten in Afghanistan might have decided to punish Steve for breaking the Pentagon-imposed pact of silence. So it's a relief to know that he's only dealing with one werewolf, not two.

***

Even with his enhanced healing ability, Steve's still pretty weak; he needs to rest if he's going to get out of hospital in time. Danny leaves him to sleep, and heads over to HQ.

Despite their combined efforts, HPD and Five-0 haven't been able to narrow down a list of suspects. Their only criteria so far are 'kinda tall', 'athletic', 'proficient with firearms', and 'probably male'. Telling them the perp isn't a werewolf will hardly help. So, once he's passed on the good news about Steve, Danny keeps his mouth shut and listens as Chin and Kono get him up to speed.

None of the crime scene evidence is yielding decent leads. The perp didn't leave any fingerprints on the shell casing and bullet, and the ballistic data won't be much help until CSU have an actual weapon to test.

HPD's tech guys have checked all the surveillance footage from a four-block radius of the restaurant. One of the traffic cameras catches a guy matching the description Danny provided, walking towards the parking lot an hour before the shooting. But his face is concealed by a baseball cap, with the hood of his rain jacket pulled up over it. They can't even identify his ethnicity, as there's no bare skin to be seen. His gloves are as black as the rest of his outfit.

Nobody matching the gunman's description shows up on any of the surrounding streets after the shooting. It's as if he ran into an alley and just vanished – into a safe house, a vehicle, or even the sewer tunnels. HPD are doing extensive legwork, searching the whole area, but they've found nothing yet.

Chin's talked to every informant he knows, but has heard no underworld chatter about a plot to kill Steve. Plenty of criminals are apparently happy that someone came so close to succeeding, but Danny's been a cop too long to be surprised by that.

Kono and Chin have been working their way through the taskforce's past cases, assessing whether any of the people Steve's taken down had relatives or friends likely to retaliate. The problem is, most of the bad guys Five-0's arrested or killed were part of a wider network of bad guys. Any one of those assholes might want to shoot Steve, and might just have been smart enough to keep his mouth shut afterwards.

"At the risk of expanding our suspect pool even further, I think we might have overlooked a couple of possibilities," Danny says. Chin's shoulders slump, and Kono cocks her head – typical veteran vs. rookie response, right there.

"First off: what if Steve wounded someone during a raid or whatever, and the guy survived and somehow got away? He could be wandering around free while his buddies are dead or in jail, and he could be mightily pissed off."

Danny stops to take a sip of coffee. "And second: there've been a few court cases recently where perps we arrested walked free because of inadmissible evidence. I've already expressed my thoughts about that, in detail, so I'll spare you a re-run."

"I think people living on Maui could hear you yelling at Steve, last time," Kono says.

"Maui? I bet folks on the mainland were covering their ears," Chin argues, grinning.

"Hey, he totally deserved it!" Danny says. "My point is, Steve did his 'enhanced interrogation' thing on most of those suspects. One of them may have been looking for payback."

"Yeah, okay," Chin says, somber now. "That would be a pretty powerful motive."

"I've just got this gut feeling that it was personal," Danny says, "and that whoever did this was seriously mad at Steve for a very specific reason. So we have to consider all avenues."

Chin sighs. "Let's hit the files again."

Danny sits down at his desk with a pile of old cases, and rubs at his aching forehead. This is how police work often goes. Evidence is scant, witnesses are non-existent or unreliable, there's no useful forensics and no obvious motive. The leads dry up, and the crime goes unsolved. Danny knows all this; he lived the reality of it every day, back in Jersey.

But since Five-0 was set up, his parameters have shifted. Danny's expectations of his colleagues and belief in their collective abilities have greatly increased, while his grip on proper procedure has loosened just a little. So far, the team have been able to solve every case and deal with every problem, even the ones that seemed impossible at the outset.

Danny simply can't accept that they could fail now, and leave Steve vulnerable to another ambush.

***

The construction work continues for four days and three nights. Thankfully, the neighbors' houses are far enough away that there are no noise complaints.

Praying that the HPD guys are as trustworthy as Chin suggests, Danny goes back to sleeping at his apartment. He mostly divides his time between the hospital and HQ, but stops by the house regularly to check on progress. It's going well, and he's pretty sure the crew will meet the deadline. He offers the bonus anyway, to boost their motivation.

Danny found Steve's secret stash at the back of his linen closet, wrapped in an old towel. The bag contains $20,000 – more cash than Danny's ever seen outside a crime scene – plus piles of British pounds, Euros, and several Asian currencies. There's also a bunch of passports in multiple names and languages, all bearing Steve's image.

The whole thing is straight out of a goddamn spy movie. Danny would feel honored that Steve trusted him with the cache's location, but in their current circumstances it's a pretty minor revelation.

He's painfully aware of time ticking away as the full moon gets closer. It's far worse for Steve, who's getting more stressed out with every day. Danny figures it's a combination of the moon's effect on him and his intense unhappiness at being bedridden and helpless.

On Wednesday morning, Danny corners Steve's doctor and asks for a status report. He's unsurprised to hear that Steve is healing remarkably well considering the severity of his chest wound, and pleased to hear that tests show no lasting injury to the brain.

"So how soon do you think he could be released?"

"He's making such good progress that it could be as early as next week," Dr. Young says.

If Steve was an ordinary guy, Danny would be thrilled at this news. But all he can think is: fuck.

"I know Steve's been agitated about those tubes and lines," Danny says. "What's the soonest that he could get free of all that intervention, at least?"

The doctor frowns. "The chest tube could come out tomorrow, perhaps. We'd need to keep up nasogastric feeding and IV fluids for a while longer, until his system can handle normal nutrition again."

"Could he check out AMA, and hire a private nursing agency to provide care at home?"

"Yes, but that would be highly inadvisable," she says severely. "He's still weak, and susceptible to post-operative infection. Are you sure you're thinking about the patient's best interests, Detective?"

"Ask him yourself," Danny says. "You'll find he's keen to get out of here as soon as possible."

Danny trails her into the room, where Steve is awake and staring at the ceiling. The only visible movement is the fingertips of his left hand, rubbing back and forth across the blanket. But Danny can read repressed tension in Steve's entire body.

Dr. Young sits down at Steve's bedside and says, "Commander, your partner here tells me that you are very eager to leave the hospital. Is that correct?"

Though Steve's voice is still raspy, his answer is clear. "Yes, doctor."

"Once we remove your chest and feeding tubes and IV lines, in a day or two, it will hypothetically be possible for you to go home. However, I strongly recommend against checking out before next week at the earliest. Do you still wish to leave?"

"Yes," Steve says again, more firmly.

"I want to take him home on Friday," Danny says, "or Saturday morning at the very latest. Please make it happen, doctor."

Dr. Young's not happy, but she nods and walks out. Steve smiles at Danny. It's a mere shadow of his usual grin, but it's the best thing Danny's seen all week.

Danny immediately starts investigating the options for home nursing assistance. It might not be needed, given Steve's rapid rate of recovery, but having something organized might placate the doctor. Danny asks several ICU nurses for advice – he's become quite close to them in recent days – and calls the private agency that they unanimously recommend.

He explains to the perky receptionist that her agency's caregivers will only be required during the day, as he'll be looking after the patient at night. Once he hangs up, Steve turns his head to smile at Danny for real this time.

"Best nursemaid ever," he says, and Danny laughs.

"If you've got a fetish for nurse outfits, buddy, you're shit outta luck."

Steve just quirks an eyebrow at him, denying nothing.

Danny waits until he's left the hospital to call Rachel; Steve doesn't need guilt over messing up Danny's Grace time on top of all his other worries. He confirms their arrangement to swap weekends, since he'll be staying at Steve's from Friday night onwards.

"All right," Rachel says. "Can you pick Grace up this afternoon for your usual mid-week visit, or would you rather reschedule?"

"Today is absolutely fine," Danny says. "I'm looking forward to it. Thanks again, Rach – you've been really good about all this."

"Not at all," she replies briskly, but Danny can tell she's pleased. It seems like they're both glad to have reached this tentative truce, for Gracie's sake if nothing else.

***

Danny heads back to HQ after lunch. Chin is sitting at the central table, leafing through Five-0's paper records, while Kono flicks from one computer file to the next.

Chin sets aside the pile of folders, and rests his head in his hands. God, he must be worn out. Danny feels guilty for having laid so much responsibility on his shoulders since Friday night.

"Let's stop focusing on motive for a moment," Chin says, "and think about method. If the gunman doesn't live on the island, he must have arrived at least a few days beforehand. He couldn't have made such a clean getaway without planning it in advance."

"Right," Kono says. "And even if it was a local, he'd still have to track Steve's movements somehow – unless he found you two at the restaurant by accident."

"I find it hard to believe that neither of us was aware of being tailed," Danny objects. "I'm observant and I've got pretty good instincts, yeah, but Steve is incredible when it comes to this kind of thing. Eyes in the back of his head, you know? Unless the perp was super stealthy, Steve should have known he was being followed."

Chin's fingers move across the screen. "Okay, let's test that theory. What time did the two of you get to the restaurant, last Friday?"

"Around 6.30, I think," Danny answers.

Pulling up the feed from the traffic camera located near the restaurant's front entrance, Chin finds the point where Danny's car turns into the driveway leading to the parking lot. It's eerie to catch a glimpse of Steve behind the wheel, healthy and whole, laughing at something. Danny wishes he could remember what joke he'd cracked to cause that reaction.

The timestamp is 6.39pm. Chin skips back a few minutes and then runs the footage, but there's no sign of their perp entering the lot before Danny and Steve arrived. The guy shows up almost an hour later, in fact, and they already know he waited another hour before ambushing Steve.

Kono looks thoughtful. "Somehow he knew you'd still be there at that time. Did you two tell anyone where you were going for dinner?"

It was only a few days ago, but Danny finds it hard to recall; so much has happened since then. "Nope, and Steve didn't book ahead either. I think we only discussed it while we were driving back to HQ that afternoon."

"So maybe he bugged your car," Kono suggests. Danny snaps his fingers at her, and the three of them rush out to the parking lot.

Chin's the one who finds the tiny bug in Danny's car, concealed under the passenger seat. There's no LED indicator and no on/off switch, so they can't tell if it's still transmitting.

Danny wants to yell into the device; he wants to threaten whoever's been spying on them, and give him one hell of a scare. But rationally, he knows that it'd be better not to let the asshole know it's been discovered. So Danny snaps a couple of close-up pictures with his phone, then silently motions for Chin to put the bug back in place and shut the passenger door.

He leans against the hood, deeply unnerved by this invasion of his privacy. Danny and Steve have gotten to know each other while sitting in this car, from blazing arguments and joking banter to long stake-outs and shared confidences. Also, it's where he spends some of his far-too-limited time with Grace, talking about her day and telling her sanitized stories about Five-0's exploits. Danny hates the thought of some anonymous fucker listening to all those conversations.

While Chin and Danny were searching the interior, Kono was carefully going over the rest of the car. Now, from her position behind the rear bumper, she beckons to them.

Once they're crouching down beside her, she points at another small, black electronic device attached to the car's underside. It looks like a GPS tracker.

"Great work, rookie," Chin says, and Kono grins at him.

"Fucking hell," Danny says as he stands up, desperately wanting to hit someone or something. Honest to God, he can't take much more of this shit without snapping. Kono's watching him anxiously, and Chin looks concerned too.

Danny clenches his fists, breathes deeply, and tries to get his thoughts in order.

"Okay, so: this vehicle has pretty advanced security features, right? A skilled car thief could possibly plant the bug inside without setting off the alarm, but an amateur couldn't manage it. So we've gotta be looking at a guy with a history of criminal activity, even if he hasn't been particularly violent before now."

"And some experience with surveillance equipment, I'd guess," Chin adds. "I'll see what I can find out about the bug and tracker, and ask HPD's techs about disabling or spoofing the signals."

"We should check our case files again, look for people with auto-related convictions or technical expertise," Kono says, and Danny nods.

"Thanks, guys," he says. "I really appreciate everything you've done on this."

Kono frowns at him. "I know how you feel about Steve, Danny. But he's our friend too, remember? We want to catch this bastard just as much as you do."

Danny bites his lip; caught up in his own worries, it's easy to overlook the impact of the shooting on other people. "Yeah, of course," he says. "I'm sorry, Kono."

Her expression clears, and she touches his arm in a gesture of forgiveness. Danny's reminded of how lucky he is to have teammates like these.

The genius squad works out a way to get the devices off his car without immediately arousing suspicion, buying precious time to analyze the outgoing signals. Chin tries to explain it further, but this hi-tech shit is way over Danny's head. The HPD tech guys also search the vehicle in minute detail, but find no other surveillance equipment. Still, Danny doesn't think he'll ever be able to fully relax in his car again.

Danny stops by the hospital on his way to pick Grace up, and gives Steve the news.

"Fuck," Steve says, his eyes wide, and Danny really has to agree. Today's discoveries take an already unsettling situation to a whole other level of creepy.

When Steve looks at Danny's photos of the two devices, he curses again. "NSA and CIA use bugs like this."

"Do not tell me we're being watched by government spooks, Steven," Danny says, massaging his throbbing temples. "I seriously cannot cope with that information today."

Steve shakes his head. "Maybe not. Could get this on the black market, if you had the right connections and money to burn."

"Like Hesse or Noshimuri, for instance." Danny sighs. "Okay, so what about the GPS tracker?"

"Far lower spec; much cheaper. Available at a specialty electronics store or online."

"Hmm," Danny says. "Now I'm having a nasty thought: could these two devices have been planted separately? The tracker by whoever shot you, and the bug by someone else?"

Steve nods. "Wouldn't be surprised – I've made enough enemies."

"It's not paranoia if they're all out to get you, huh?"

Danny has to joke, because otherwise he might scream.

***

As he drives across town to his daughter's school, Danny tries to clear his mind – he can't show any of these dark thoughts to her. The delighted look on Gracie's face when she sees him waiting really helps to lift his mood.

"Danno!" she shouts, running towards him, and he swings her up into his arms.

"Hey monkey," he says, "I'm so happy to see you." She hugs him tight; he rests his cheek against her soft hair and breathes deeply.

There's a big rainstorm brewing, so they decide to catch a movie. Grace wants to see Tangled again, having already gone with Rachel before Christmas, and to his surprise Danny actually enjoys it. For 100 minutes he's immersed in a more innocent world, where the good guys always win and live happily ever after.

After the movie, the two of them have dinner at their favorite Italian place in Honolulu. As they get in the car to head back to Rachel's, Grace asks, "Daddy, can we visit Uncle Steve? I drew a picture in school today and I want to give it to him."

"You did? That was real nice of you, sweetheart." Danny thinks for a moment. ICU visiting hours are over, but the nurses won't be able to resist his daughter's puppy dog eyes. And although Steve needs his rest, seeing Grace might really cheer him up.

Steve looks asleep when they reach his room, but opens his eyes as soon as Danny calls his name softly.

"Hey Danno; hey kiddo," he says, pleasure and surprise evident on his face. Danny adjusts the angle of the bed so Steve can see them better.

"Hi, Uncle Steve," Grace says. "I'm sorry you're hurt. Here, I made this for you!"

She holds up a picture of Steve's house. Standing on the beach outside it are Grace in her favorite pink swimsuit, Danny in a shirt and pants, and Steve in his blue swim trunks. Little swirls of color represent his tattoos.

Steve stares at the drawing, apparently transfixed; Danny guesses that no child ever drew him a picture before. "Thank you, Grace. That's great," Steve says, carefully setting it on the bedside table.

"It's a masterpiece, is what it is," Danny says proudly, and Grace beams at him. Her innocent depiction of the three of them together tugs at his heart. He wants that, for real.

"Hey, monkey," he says, "you wanna tell Steve about the movie we saw today?"

Perching on the side of Steve's bed, Grace launches into a synopsis of Tangled. The simple plot gets way more complicated – and much funnier – when it's described by an 8-year-old.

Though he's obviously tired, Steve does his best to follow along. But he keeps glancing at Danny, like he can't quite believe that Grace is here and sitting just inches away.

This is the closest Danny can get to fulfilling his declaration of total trust in Steve. So he leans back in his chair, body language deliberately casual, and smiles as he listens to his daughter.

When she's reached the inevitable happy ending, Danny says, "Gracie, do you remember what you wanted to ask him?"

She nods, and turns to Steve. "Can we come to your house next weekend? I like swimming with you."

"Next weekend?" Steve questions, looking at Danny.

"Rachel and I swapped weekends. No big deal," Danny says, projecting 'so don't beat yourself up about it' vibes at Steve. "Grace is cool with it, isn't that right?"

"Yup, 'cos I get to go to Marisol's birthday party. We're watching my new Hannah Montana DVD."

"Oh. Good." Steve sounds a little lost, and Danny struggles not to grin. "And sure, Grace, you can visit next weekend. But I don't know if I'll be okay to swim by then."

"Maybe I can go in the water with you instead," Danny offers. "Would you like that, monkey?" He doesn't miss the way his partner's eyes widen at this suggestion – is Steve imagining Danny in swim trunks right now?

"Yeah!" Grace says, with touching enthusiasm. He really should get over his dislike of the ocean, and go swimming with her more often.

"Okay, we'll see. But we have to go now," Danny tells her. "It's nearly your bedtime, and Steve needs his rest too."

He expects Grace to just say goodnight. Instead, she tilts her head thoughtfully. "Uncle Steve, do you need a hug? I like getting hugs when I don't feel good."

The shocked look on Steve's face is kinda funny, but kinda sad too – the guy obviously doesn't receive enough spontaneous gestures of affection.

After Danny nods encouragingly at him, Steve says, "Yeah, kiddo, I'd like that. Just be careful of the bandages and tubes, okay?"

So Grace leans against the undamaged side of his chest, head on his left shoulder and one small hand curled around his neck. Steve wraps his free arm around her, visibly relaxing into the embrace. Danny bites his lip at the sight of his two favorite people, nestled together so sweetly. He fixes the image in his mind.

Grace looks like she could fall asleep right here, but Danny has to get her home. He doesn't want to stretch Rachel's goodwill to breaking point.

"Time to go, sweetheart," he says quietly.

"Okay, Daddy," she says, stretching up to kiss Steve's cheek before sliding off the bed.

Steve smiles at her. "'Night, Grace."

Danny wishes he could kiss Steve goodnight, too. He settles for touching his wrist and saying, "Sleep well. I'll see you tomorrow."

"Thank you," is all Steve says. But God, the way he looks at Danny...it's like the sun's come out after a week of rain.

"My pleasure," Danny murmurs. Reluctantly, he turns and follows Grace out the door.

***

Chapter Text

Because the universe hasn't finished fucking with Danny, there's more bad news to come on Thursday.

Chin and the HPD techs spent Wednesday afternoon examining the two devices found in Danny's car, and came to the same conclusion as Steve. The GPS locator is something you could buy from any decent electronics store; the bug is a seriously high-end item that's more sensitive than the standard law enforcement kind, and can transmit over a much greater distance.

Though the genius squad tried a bunch of fancy tricks, they couldn't get any useful data from the bug. In the end, they disabled it and the tracker but preserved them as evidence.

On Thursday morning, Danny, Chin, and HPD chief tech Zach head to Steve's place. First off, they search Steve's truck for surveillance equipment. Though there's no sign of any GPS, the tiny bug hidden under the driver's seat is identical to the one from Danny's car. With the first device already disabled, there's no way they can use this one to broadcast false information. So once they've dusted it for fingerprints, and found none, Zach drops the bug into a bottle of water to drown it.

The next step is to check the house itself. Danny asks the construction workers to take a break outside – at least it's sunny for a change – while Zach does the sweep. His RF detector leads them to a bug behind a photo frame on the living room wall, one under the dresser in Steve's bedroom, and another inside an ornament on Jack McGarrett's old desk. Again, they're all the type apparently favored by both government spooks and wealthy criminals.

Danny stomps out onto the lawn, fists clenched, and startles the laborers by gazing up at the sky and swearing loudly and creatively. Chin just stands patiently outside the back door, arms folded. "Feel any better?" he asks as they walk to the car.

"Little bit, yeah."

They also stop by Danny's apartment, just in case, but he's not surprised when no bugs are found. Anybody who's been studying Five-0 would be aware that Steve rarely visits Danny there. At least this confirms that Steve is the sole target of the surveillance operation; it's good to know, but hardly comforting.

Chin takes the bugs away with him – he and Zach are planning to sweep HQ while they're at it – and Danny drives to the hospital. He's glad to have some time alone to work the problem through, although he's now too paranoid to think out loud as he used to.

Figuring out when the listening devices were planted might help point to who. Steve had discovered masked men inside his house just over three weeks ago, the same day that Mary was kidnapped. The intruders hacked the alarm company's system, knocked Steve out with a stun gun, and stole the 'Champ' toolbox. So there's a good chance they hid the bugs in Steve's house and truck before leaving.

That would mean that the yakuza are the ones spying on Steve. The revelation that Hiro Noshimuri's brother probably murdered Steve's mother might have been the tip of the iceberg. Could there be some deeper conspiracy that they don't want Steve to uncover?

Being bugged by powerful Japanese gangsters is bad enough, but if the infiltration happened much earlier – before Taylor's assault on Steve's place – then Danny has even more reason to be worried. Steve was lying on the living room couch when he originally told Danny about his reaction to silver, and they discussed it further in his bedroom. Now Danny's incredibly glad that he started that big werewolf conversation out on the beach, and never mentioned the subject inside the house.

But then there's the option behind door number two. Whoever's doing this is smart and thorough, with access to very expensive equipment. So yeah, it could well be the Pentagon that's behind it all. The top brass must have been unhappy when a highly-trained SEAL Commander with highly-useful powers transferred to the Reserves and turned cop. Maybe they've had Steve under surveillance the whole time, to make sure he stays quiet.

Surely the news of Steve's shooting has reached Washington by now, and surely someone there could look at the lunar cycle and put two and two together. In that case...Jesus, are armed commandos going to show up sometime before the transformation, to take Steve away or to permanently silence both him and Danny?

As he's pulling into the hospital parking lot, Danny gets a call from Chin: Zach's found one bug in Steve's office, and another under the computer table. That makes seven in total, all clean of fingerprints and lacking any identifying features that might prove who purchased them.

Danny hangs up and rests his forehead on the steering wheel, too freaked out now even to curse. He's just a cop from Jersey, for fuck's sake – he's not equipped to deal with all this espionage shit.

When Danny gets to the ICU, he lays the whole bug situation out for Steve. He starts off pacing across the room, and winds up sitting with his head in his hands.

"Hey, Danno, breathe. It's okay." Steve sounds surprisingly calm.

Danny jumps a little when he feels Steve's hand on his hair, tentatively smoothing it back into place. The touch feels so good that he can't help leaning into it, but even that doesn't placate him.

"Name one thing about this situation that is remotely okay, Steven," Danny says.

"Well, now we know we're being watched," Steve replies.

"Yeah, I'll concede that one," Danny says without raising his head. "Still, there's a non-zero chance that the federal government will send men to kidnap or kill you between now and Saturday night. Oh, and maybe they'll take me out too. That doesn't concern you at all?"

Steve places two fingertips under Danny's chin, tilting his face up. The gentle gesture is at odds with Steve's fierce expression. "Of course it concerns me. But we're not defenseless, and we won't make it easy for them."

Danny sighs. "You and me against the world, right?"

And Steve just smiles.

When he gets back to HQ, Danny tries to put the bigger mystery aside and focus on the GPS locator. Unlike the bugs, the tracker bears a serial number – Chin's following that up with the manufacturer. In the meantime, Danny can try to figure out when and where the device got planted on his car.

Danny's working on the assumption that the gunman was responsible, and that the guy prefers to operate in the dark. Well, there are only three places Danny regularly parks at night: his apartment, the McGarrett house, and here. Though there are no security cameras close to Steve's, the parking lot of Danny's complex and HQ are both under 24-hour surveillance. It's a long shot, but still the best lead they've got.

Kono, Chin and Danny spend the rest of Thursday going through the two sets of footage, working backwards from Friday night to see if the perp shows up at either location. It takes many tedious hours, but they eventually get a hit. At 1am on the Monday before the shooting, a man dressed in black knelt down behind Danny's car while it was parked outside his apartment. He fiddled with something under the back bumper for a minute, and then walked away.

Danny wants to punch a wall when he sees this, because Grace was staying with him that weekend. It's awful to think that the man who tried to kill Steve was only yards away from his little girl as she slept. Compared to that, the shooter knowing where Danny lives is a minor concern.

Just like on Friday night, the perp is wearing gloves, a baseball cap and a rain jacket in this new footage. But this time he's carelessly left the hood of his jacket down, revealing a narrow strip of skin and hair on the back of his neck. The light from a nearby streetlamp shows that he is a Caucasian guy with short, light brown hair.

This lucky break narrows down the suspect pool a lot, because white folks are a distinct minority in Hawaii. Still...even after Chin goes through and excludes other ethnic groups, they're left with a depressingly large number of guys who might have wanted to shoot Steve.

***

Though he's frustrated by the investigation's slow progress, and fearful of another attempt on Steve's life, Danny can't devote his full attention to the problem. He has a werewolf transformation to prepare for.

Saturday will be Steve's first change since that initial full moon after he was bitten, in 2006. He's been trying to put a brave face on it, but Danny can tell he's afraid.

So on Friday morning, before Dr. Young makes her rounds, Danny initiates what he knows will be a difficult conversation.

"Listen, Steve," he says softly. "After we talked about this in November, I promised myself I'd never ask again. But I need to know what to expect tomorrow night. So can you tell me how it played out last time?"

Steve closes his eyes and clenches his fists. His expression suggests he's back in that military hospital, reliving the experience. Danny bites the inside of his cheek, so fucking sorry to trigger these awful memories again, and waits.

When Steve finally answers, his voice is barely above a whisper. "I was still present in my head, so I could see and hear everything. But it was like my human consciousness was just a passenger. The animal had full control, and it cared about nothing except escaping and feeding. Luckily the staff provided a whole pile of raw beef...I hate to think what would have happened if any humans were nearby and accessible."

Steve shudders, and Danny aches for him. Being trained and ready to take lives is one thing; you make the necessary choices, and you deal with the consequences. The prospect of your body killing – or infecting – other people against your will must be far, far worse.

"Okay," Danny says, projecting a calmness he doesn't feel, "I'll stock up on red meat so you won't go hungry. Do you remember how long the whole process took? Was the tipping point sunset or moonrise?"

"Sundown," Steve says, "but I got locked up an hour earlier. And the sun was already up when they took me back to my hospital room."

"So we'll follow that pattern, then. Maybe extend it out a little more, just to be sure," Danny says. "Next question: did you come out with any physical damage? Will I need to stock the first aid kit with extra supplies, or take you back to the ER?"

"I didn't have any injuries when I went in, that first time. The...the wolf threw itself against the door a lot, trying to get out. So I came out with bruises and cuts all over my body, plus one hell of a headache. But I was fine again within hours."

Thinking back, Danny realizes that this is the first time Steve has even said the word 'wolf' to him. It's progress, of sorts.

"Shifting shape was –" Steve swallows hard "– excruciating, but the doctors explained that the transformation itself is actually restorative. They'd had badly wounded men go through it, and come out practically healed."

Steve pauses to take a sip of water. "I saw it for myself. There was this Army major with two broken legs; he fell down a steep hillside while trying to evade the wolf. But after the moon, the guy walked out of his cell without a limp and was back on active duty a few days later."

"Huh, okay," Danny says. "That's an unexpected upside. You might be good as new by this time Sunday."

Steve looks bleak. "I'd rather have a year of slow, painful recovery than face this again," he admits.

Danny takes Steve's tightly-clenched hand, unfurling his fingers one by one and rubbing at his palm gently. "I know, babe, but you'll get through it. I have total faith in you. And in 48 hours, it'll all be over and you can move on." He takes a deep breath, and takes the plunge. "Maybe we can move on together."

Steve's eyes widen, and he opens his mouth to reply. But just then there's a sharp rap on the door. Steve pulls his hand away, and the moment is lost.

"Good morning," Dr. Young says briskly as she walks into Steve's room. "Let's assess your status, Commander."

Danny goes over to the window and stares out blindly, cursing the doctor's shitty timing, as she performs a thorough examination. Dr. Young declares that Steve has healed remarkably well. The tube in Steve's chest can come out this morning; after that, he'll be able to leave.

"But ideally, you should continue to receive nasogastric feeding for another 24 hours – and it'd be easier to do that here," she points out.

Danny and Steve have a brief whispered argument, assessing the pros and cons. If Steve goes home now, the construction noise will probably keep him awake all day. If he waits until tomorrow, and continues to heal rapidly, then he may not need the nursing agency's care at all. That would remove the risk of having strangers in the house so close to his transformation.

Steve calls the doctor back into the room, and says, "I'm willing to stay, so long as I can go home tomorrow free of any tubes or lines."

Dr. Young says, "All right, we should be able to manage that. I'll come back after my rounds to remove the chest drain."

Once she's gone, Steve and Danny look at each other silently. The earlier mood between them has been broken, and Danny can't figure out how to fix it.

"I have to head off now," Danny eventually says. "Places to go, people to see. Get plenty of rest today, okay? I'll come back later."

"Sure," Steve says, sinking back into his pillows and closing his eyes. But Danny bets that sleep will be a long time coming.

***

Danny's next stop is HQ, where he tells Chin and Kono that Steve will be released from hospital tomorrow. They both look about as worn out as Danny feels, but cheer up a little when they hear his news.

The two of them have run through the reduced list of possible suspects, but nobody's popped so far. Some of the guys can be ruled out as too tall or too short; some are in prison, others have airtight alibis for last Friday, and a few were off the island at the time.

Now it seems like the bugs were planted separately, there's no guarantee that the perp has either electronics know-how or experience with breaking into cars. And there's still a chance that the gunman is someone so unlikely that he's not even on Five-0's radar screen.

It's infuriating that a week has passed since the attack, and they're not much closer to catching the fucker who hurt Steve.

Chin gets a call while Danny's looking through the files again. It's the manufacturer of the GPS tracker, with some interesting info.

"The company looked up the serial number I gave them. Turns out that particular device was shipped to a Radio Shack in Los Angeles," Chin reports. He taps at the screen, and a map of the store's location comes up.

"You said it was the real-time kind of GPS locator, right? So whoever bought it had to sign up at the manufacturer's website before they could track us," Danny says.

"Yeah," Chin says. "It got activated Sunday before last, just prior to the perp planting it on your car. But it was registered using a fake name and address here in Honolulu, so that's not much use."

"We know this guy is smart," Danny says, "so I'm guessing he used cash or a fake credit card to buy the thing. Still, let's contact the store to make sure."

Kono nods, and heads into her office to make the call.

"So our perp might live in California," Danny says. He looks at the map again, noting that the store is just a mile north of LA's biggest airport. "...or maybe not. If he flew out here from the mainland, there's a good chance he'd have to travel via LAX. He could've gone shopping during his layover."

"Yeah, possibly. But it could also be a local, coming home from a trip," Chin says. "He might have thought it'd be safer to buy the GPS on the mainland."

Kono comes back out to the central table and says, "According to the manager of the Radio Shack, that particular GPS tracker only arrived in store three weeks ago. Her inventory shows that the item never left the shelf, but she just went to check and found its box empty. Looks like our shooter's a shoplifter too."

"What an asshole. Damn, I knew there was a reason I hated him," Danny says. Kono rolls her eyes, unimpressed by his gallows humor.

"Well, we know the GPS got planted on my car 11 days ago," Danny goes on. "That's a pretty small window of opportunity for him to steal it in LA, fly out to Hawaii, and start watching us. And he must have been here long enough to observe how often Steve rides in my car; otherwise, he would have just tracked Steve's truck instead."

"Okay," Chin says. "Kono, ask the store manager to send us the surveillance footage from that ten-day period, ASAP. This might be our chance to finally get a good look at our perp."

"Great work, guys," Danny says. "But I've got to leave you to it, sorry. Steve's fridge needs restocking before he comes home tomorrow, and I should make sure the house is in a habitable state."

Chin nods. "Do you want us to meet you at the hospital in the morning, make an occasion out of it?"

"Or, hey, we could form a welcoming committee at his place," Kono suggests.

Danny loves these two, he does, but – no.

"I think Steve's going to be grumpy as hell, for a while," Danny claims. "He's still sore and weak, even if he is determined to check out regardless."

"You organized some home care for him, right?" Chin asks.

"Yeah, but God knows how polite he's gonna be to the nurses. At least I'll be there to smack him if he's too insufferable."

"We could we stop by the house later on Saturday, give you a break from Steve-sitting," Kono offers.

Fuck, that'd be a seriously bad idea. "Let me just get him settled, okay? He'll probably need to sleep most of the weekend, anyway. Monday might be a better day for visiting."

Kono looks like she wants to argue, so Danny pulls out the big guns. He rubs at the back of his neck, as though he's embarrassed, and doesn't meet her eyes.

"Sorry, Kono. I just – I kind of want Steve to myself, for a little bit. I came so close to losing him, you know? I think it'd really help us to have a quiet couple of days on our own."

Her expression softens. "Yeah, okay, I get that. So were you ever going to tell us about the two of you?"

"Hey now," Danny says, "you're detectives, aren't you? I can't go giving you all the answers on a plate. Anyway, Steve and I both have good reasons for not being out and proud."

Chin says, "Sure, brah. It's cool with us."

Kono nods in agreement. "We can keep a secret."

"Thanks, guys," Danny says. "Your support means a lot."

Though nothing he's said is a lie, Danny is definitely letting them make false assumptions. He'd commit worse sins than this in order to protect Steve, but he still feels guilty.

"It's hardly a surprise, I gotta admit," Chin says. "You're practically joined at the hip, even off-duty."

"Plus, you two bicker like my parents, and they've been married 30 years," adds Kono with a grin.

Danny opens his mouth to deny it, but thinks better of it. He waves one hand dismissively in Kono's direction, and walks out of the room with her bright laughter ringing in his ears.

With another bullet successfully dodged – Danny's starting to feel like Neo in The Matrix – he heads to the grocery store for vital supplies. It feels utterly surreal, to be surrounded by ordinary people doing an everyday chore. Meanwhile, Danny's cart is full of raw steak, hopefully enough to feed a ravenous werewolf, and enough snacks and caffeinated beverages to get an anxious human through a long night's vigil.

Danny picks up the ingredients for his great-grandma's chicken soup as well. The strained broth will be perfect for Steve, who will be coming off a week of being fed through a tube, and making the soup will have a soothing effect on Danny. He sure could do with being soothed right now. He's holding it together for Steve's sake, and providing as much support as possible, but can't let his guard down enough for anyone else to comfort him.

Next, Danny shops for some other crucial items. He buys half a dozen large woolen blankets so he can create a comfortable warm nest on the basement's concrete floor. It's quite likely that wolf-Steve won't even sit down all night, let alone sleep, but Danny figures it'd be smart to provide the option.

He also gets a metal water trough and a large feeding bowl. Standing in front of the pet store's extensive display of dog stuff, he briefly contemplates getting one labeled 'Fido' or something else ridiculous. But Steve doesn't have a sense of humor when it comes to this whole thing, and Danny is not a cruel person.

He heads back to Steve's house to put the groceries away and see how things are going. It's a whirlwind of noise and activity as the laborers strive to meet the looming deadline. Danny pitches in to lend a hand, vacuuming up dust from the living room floor and lugging debris to the dumpster outside.

Then the security consultant sits him down and patiently explains the CCTV system that's been installed. There's an option to record the video feed to the hard drive of Danny's laptop, but no way in hell would he take that risk. Whatever happens in the basement stays in the basement.

The crew finishes at sunset, and the foreman takes Danny on a tour. They've done a great job on the basement, fixed the damage from November's shoot-out, and strengthened the house's overall security. Danny shakes everyone's hands gratefully; he pays each man the promised bonus, and gives the security expert $500 in cash too.

After they all leave, Danny leans against the closed front door and heaves a sigh of relief. Fuck, he can't quite believe they got it done in time.

He drives back to the hospital to tell Steve the great news, and maybe continue that conversation they tentatively started this morning. But he finds his partner sound asleep, breaths deep and even. Danny is reluctant to wake him – the transformation will probably be draining as hell, so Steve needs all the rest he can get.

Instead, he leaves a note on the bedside table: 'Everything is ship-shape at home, ready for your return. See you tomorrow, D.' Then he tiptoes out again.

***

Steve is sitting on the edge of his hospital bed at 8am Saturday, freshly showered and wearing his own clothes. It's so ridiculously good to see him upright, dressed, and disconnected from all those machines. If Danny couldn't tell that Steve is practically vibrating with anxious tension, it'd be a very pleasant picture.

Dr. Young's not on duty today, so a male doctor is handling the paperwork. He runs Steve through the risks of leaving AMA, and makes him sign forms releasing the hospital from any liability. Steve receives strict instructions to seek follow-up care from his own physician. Danny knows he won't, though...the fewer people that know how fast he heals, the better.

Steve balks at having to leave the hospital in a wheelchair; Danny folds his arms, and stares him down.

"Park your ass in the goddamn chair, Steven," he orders. Steve scowls but complies, and Danny wheels him out of the room.

Every nurse they pass on their way out of the ICU stops to say goodbye. Steve hasn't exactly been a model patient – as Danny well knows, he hates hospitals at the best of times. But with the full moon getting closer, Steve has become irritable and brusque with pretty much everyone except Danny.

Because the universe is unfair, a stunningly attractive guy like Steve can get away with being an asshole. Danny's overheard many admiring comments from the nurses; he wouldn't be surprised if they drew lots to choose who'd give Steve his sponge bath.

One notable exception to the fan club was Michelle, an ICU nurse who turns out to have been Steve's girlfriend when they were 16. Hawaii really is far too fucking small. She was professional but cold towards him all week. But now that Steve has belatedly apologized for leaving her (and the island) so abruptly, and failing to keep in touch after, even Michelle is willing to smile at him.

As they head down the corridor, smiles and good wishes are sent Danny's way too. His favorite nurse, Travis, claps him on the shoulder and says, "Good luck keeping him in bed, brah!"

Danny grins back at him. He contemplates making a crack about putting his tie collection to good use, but decides against it. He and Steve haven't even kissed yet...it's way too early to joke about bondage.

They make it to the hospital's front door and out to the car without incident, escorted by two HPD officers. It's a sunny day instead of a rainy night, but Danny can't help feeling nervous as they cross the parking lot. He gets Steve settled in the passenger seat, insists that he wear his seatbelt, and then drives under the speed limit all the way home.

The HPD guys follow in a squad car, and park outside the front gate. They and their colleagues are under orders to continue the rotating guard duty, at least for the next few days. If Danny has his way, Steve won't be left unprotected until they catch the shooter.

Danny talks his partner through the enhanced protective measures on the house. The front and back doors have extra-strong deadbolts, now, and all the windows have locks or security latches. Danny chose the new six-digit alarm code: it's the zip code of his parents' neighborhood in Jersey, backwards, plus 'eight' for Grace's age. He explains this to Steve, saying that he's welcome to change it.

But Steve says, "No, I like it."

Ignoring Danny's suggestion that he go upstairs and rest, Steve insists on seeing the basement first.

The old door at the top of the steps was pretty flimsy, with a simple catch. The replacement is made of hardwood with a solid steel core, and the doorjamb has been reinforced too. The door can now be locked from either the basement or living room side, and requires both a physical key and an electronic key code. Danny chose this combination too, and he and Steve are the only ones who know it. The alarm company won't be monitoring this door.

The entryway is so small that Steve has to bend almost double, causing a gasp of pain followed by a coughing fit. He'll probably fit quite easily in wolf form, but something will have gone seriously wrong if he gets that far.

The second barrier is at the bottom of the steps. It resembles a jail cell door, but the steel bars are much thicker than those generally used to contain humans. This door requires another physical key.

For the purposes of tonight, a layer of foam four inches thick has been glued to the door. If wolf-Steve throws his full weight desperately against it, over and over, at least the cushioning will minimize his bruises.

Inside the basement, a thicker layer of soundproof padding has been attached to all four concrete walls – it looks like something out of an old mental asylum. It's there to muffle sound, but also to protect Steve from himself.

The camera in one corner of the ceiling is wired for sound, even though the prospect of hearing Steve howl freaks Danny out. There's a speaker next to the camera, too, in case Danny needs to communicate with Steve.

Danny fetches a stepladder from the garage, and tapes the written combination and the two keys to the camera's top side. Steve can reach if he stands on tiptoe; the wolf won't have a hope. Danny will have the duplicates upstairs, of course, and the plan is for him to let Steve out in the morning. But if something happens to Danny tonight, Steve has to be able to free himself tomorrow.

Some nifty work by the crew's plumber means there's now running water down here. A stainless steel basin and toilet have been installed, and there's also a bare metal bed frame against one wall. The set-up helps maintain the cover story, of course. But given Steve's line of work, he really might need to use this space as a safe room or holding cell someday.

Steve stands in the middle of the basement and looks around. "This looks perfect," he says. "You did a great job, Danny – thanks."

Danny smiles, but says, "Wait 'til you see the contractor's invoice. You might not be so pleased then!"

Steve shrugs, and then yawns widely.

"Right," Danny says, "time for a nap." He helps Steve up the stairs to bed, just like he did back in November.

God...that was only two months ago, and so much has changed.

Once he gets Steve settled, Danny heads back to the kitchen and starts making chicken soup. The process is so familiar that he can let his thoughts wander. Once he's run through his mental 'to do' list, twice, he tries to relax and clear his mind.

While the broth is simmering, Danny sits down at the dining table and types out an email to his parents and siblings. He deliberately keeps the tone light and cheerful, saying that Gracie's doing well in school and is keen to learn how to surf. His family already knows about the shooting, because Danny phoned Ma last Sunday when he was desperate for comfort. Now, he tells them that Steve's out of hospital and recovering well.

Danny also makes a point of noting how helpful and supportive Rachel has been this week. Ma's never forgiven Rachel for breaking her eldest boy's heart, but Danny needs her to accept that his ex-wife will always be part of their lives.

He attaches a bunch of image files to the email: Grace's latest school picture and some candid shots of her, plus a couple of photos that Steve took of Danny and Grace at the beach. In the first one, he's giving her a piggy-back ride. Gracie is beaming at the camera, and Danny is looking up at her with a goofy grin on his face. In the second one, they're watching the sun set over the ocean. She's leaning against his side, and he has his arm around her.

Danny hits 'send' and sits back in his chair, blowing out a breath. That's one task crossed off his list. If everything goes to hell tonight, Danny wants his family to have these last positive memories of him.

***

Once the soup's cooled, Danny heads upstairs with a tray. He gets Steve propped up against the pillows, then sits on the side of the bed. It's their first meal together since the shooting.

Steve gulps down his broth, polishing off two helpings by the time Danny's finished one. "This tastes even better than I remembered," he says, licking his lips.

Danny smiles in response. He swaps the empty bowl for a bottle of water, which Steve rapidly drains as well. "Did you get any sleep?"

Looking down at his hands, Steve shakes his head. Danny guesses that it was impossible for him to relax, given the anxiety thrumming under his skin.

"Do you need me to get you anything else?"

Steve meets his eyes and says, "No, Danny. I just need you to listen." And the look on his face now is so bleak that Danny wants to run, wants to cover his ears – anything to avoid whatever's coming next. Instead, he sits still and nods.

"If I get out tonight," Steve says slowly, "you have to kill me."

Oh, no. Danny's thought about this scenario; it's kept him awake every night this week. Hearing it out loud still breaks his heart.

"Don't say that," he protests.

"I'm sorry," Steve says. "It's a terrible burden to put on your shoulders, and you've done so much already. But I couldn't live with myself if I hurt or infected anyone...especially not you."

"Christ, Steve." Danny feels like crying. He shouldn't have to do this. Hell, Steve shouldn't have to go through this whole ordeal at all. He served his country with such courage and dedication, and this is the price he has to pay. It's so fucking unfair.

"I swear, Danny, that's what I need you to do. Promise me."

"But I've only got my sidearm," Danny says, dodging the demand. "Ordinary bullets can hurt you in wolf form, but not kill you. That's how it works, right?"

"Yeah." Steve hesitates, then says, "Go over to my closet, and bring me the metal box from the back right corner of the top shelf."

Danny has a bad feeling about this, but he does what Steve asks. The container has an electronic keypad on the front, and is so heavy that he nearly drops it.

Steve enters the numerical code slowly, allowing Danny to memorize it, and lifts the lid.

Inside are rows and rows of silver bullets. There's a wide range of calibers, and at least a dozen of them will fit Danny's gun.

Steve's fingertips hover over the box, without touching its contents. "One silver round will have an instant toxic impact, wherever you hit me. But it'll just slow me down, not stop me. The only way to be sure is to shoot me through the heart."

The bullets look so shiny and pure – it's hard to reconcile their beauty with the appalling damage they could inflict on Steve.

"If you come at me in wolf form," Danny says, staring at the bullets through tear-blurred eyes, "I will shoot you. But I will try to incapacitate you just enough to get you back behind the basement door."

Danny looks up again, not even trying to hide how much this is affecting him. "Please don't make me promise to kill you, Steve. I just can't."

Steve nods, apparently satisfied. Closing the box, he puts it on his bedside table.

He bites his lip, then says, "I can never thank you enough for doing all this."

"You're my partner," Danny replies, wiping at his eyes. "I swore I wouldn't let you down."

"Is that the only reason?"

"Well, you're my best friend too," Danny says. "Friends don't let friends turn into wolves alone, right?"

Steve just looks at him; Danny drops his gaze, discomfited.

"I'm trying to be brave here," Steve says softly.

Danny's about to launch into a re-run of that speech he made about Rambo, after Steve was shot. But then he suddenly remembers what Steve had mumbled, in the restaurant's parking lot: 'I'm sorry...I should have been braver'.

Now Danny thinks he understands.

His heart starts pounding, but he has to be sure. "Brave about tonight, or brave about you and me?"

"Us," Steve says. It's such a simple little word, with such huge implications.

"You picked one hell of a time to come out," Danny says, his mouth on autopilot while his brain is processing.

Steve's lips quirk upwards slightly. "Not much left to lose, at this point." But his eyes are serious, and they're fixed on Danny's face.

And yeah, okay. Danny can do last-ditch honesty too.

"I want you, Steve," he says, and in a way it's a relief to finally admit it. "I've wanted you since we met."

"Me too," is all Steve says, but there's a world of feeling in his expression. "I'm sorry I waited so long to tell you. At first I didn't know you were bi; after that, I was just a coward."

Danny shrugs. "It takes two – I could have made a move earlier, myself. But what about Cath? Because I gotta tell you upfront: I don't share."

"We're real casual," Steve says, "so I don't think she'll be too devastated when I break things off."

"And 'Don't ask, don't tell'?"

"I don't give a fuck anymore," Steve says fiercely. "I've been in the Navy for half my life now, and sacrificed so much. I think I've earned the right to be selfish!"

"Hey, no arguments from me on that score," Danny says. "Just...this is the real thing for me, you understand? I need to be sure you've thought it through."

"I have, Danny, I swear," Steve assures him, and okay, that's good enough. No more talking, now.

Danny leans forward, and brushes his lips over Steve's. Even that slight contact is electrifying, after waiting so long for this. Then Steve opens his mouth, and the touch of his tongue against Danny's lower lip makes Danny shiver.

For long minutes, he gets lost in the incredible feeling of Steve's mouth on his. They're not touching anywhere else, but Danny's skin feels hot and hyper-sensitized all over.

Steve's breathing is becoming strained, and not in a good way. He's wheezing when Danny pulls back, but says, "No, don't stop."

"Not stopping," Danny promises, "just repositioning." He coaxes Steve into stretching out on his back, head propped up with pillows. Then Danny lies down on his side, pressing his body close to Steve's.

Steve's lips part and his eyes widen when Danny's erection pushes against his hip. For a brief moment Danny anticipates a freak-out, but instead Steve turns his head and kisses the breath out of him.

Danny's desperate to get his hands on Steve's beautiful body. Steve is only wearing pajama pants, so there's plenty of warm smooth skin to explore. He runs his fingertips over Steve's chest, skirting around the bandaged area; he teases at Steve's nipple, bending forward to pull it into his mouth, and Steve moans. Danny licks across his chest, and then kisses the skin over his heart.

Steve is holding himself motionless, watching, and there are tiny tremors through his body. Danny moves lower, stroking across Steve's toned belly and curving over his hip. Steve's erection is tenting his pajamas, and Danny can't wait to see, touch, and taste. But he tells himself to take his time and make it last. So he trails his fingertips just above the waistband, and goes no further.

Those good intentions fly out the goddamn window when Steve groans, "Please, Danny," flexing up into Danny's caress. Danny can't ignore such naked need, so he kneels beside Steve and strips him bare.

The sight of Steve's long, hard cock makes Danny lick his lips. He reaches out with his index finger to trace a path, starting behind Steve's balls and trailing up his shaft to the head. Bringing his fingertip to his mouth, Danny licks the pre-come off.

"Oh, God," Steve says, pupils blown wide.

Danny feels overwhelmed by all the things he wants to do to Steve. But if he only gets one chance at this, he knows how he wants it to go. Shifting so he's between Steve's parted legs, Danny sucks that gorgeous cock into his mouth in one swift motion.

"Fuck," Steve gasps, his hips jerking up. Danny lays a hand on each hip, holding him down, and Steve's breath hitches in his throat.

It's been a while since Danny did this, but Christ, it feels even better than he remembered – especially because it's Steve, and he's fantasized about this so often. He loves the way Steve's cock feels: heavy on his tongue and thick in his mouth, pulling his lips wide and pushing into his throat.

Steve's incredibly responsive, his groans and curses and stuttered breaths telling Danny exactly what he likes. Danny sinks down as far as he can, hollowing his cheeks and sucking hard. Pulling back, he licks his way up the sensitive underside, swirls his tongue around the head, then swallows Steve's cock down again.

It doesn't take much longer before Steve moans, "Oh fuck, 'm gonna..." But Danny doesn't pull off – he wants everything Steve can give him. Steve comes down Danny's throat with a strangled shout, his body shaking, and Danny swallows down every drop.

He leans back, licking his lips. Once Steve catches his breath, he says, "Jesus, Danny – as if I didn't already have enough filthy thoughts about your mouth!"

Danny grins, adjusting himself in his pants. He might ask Steve to share one of those fantasies pretty soon, while he gets himself off. Steve's hardly up to returning the favor, since he can't move much.

Steve looks him up and down. "Why are you wearing so many clothes, huh?"

"You and my clothing choices, babe...it's like a broken record," Danny complains, just for form's sake.

"Maybe," Steve says, "but I think we can both agree you'd be better off naked right now."

Since Danny really can't argue with that, he shifts off the bed and starts stripping. Steve watches, a hungry look on his face. And Danny realizes something: the only time Steve's ever seen his bare chest was when Danny used his shirt as a makeshift bandage, and that hardly counts. Hell, Steve hasn't even seen his legs above the ankle.

Danny suddenly wonders if this is how a virgin might have felt in the olden days, when she disrobed for her new husband on their wedding night.

When he removes his boxers, Steve exhales loudly. He stretches one hand in Danny's direction, and says, "Come here."

Danny lies down on his side, as he'd done earlier. His cock is even harder now and he's ready to jerk off just like this.

But Steve says, "Let me" in a rough voice, and that's the best offer Danny's had all day.

Still, he has just enough upstairs brain left to ask, "Are you sure? You can't risk tearing your stitches."

"Trust me," Steve says, and yeah, Danny can do that – that's his SOP, after all. They kiss again, Steve moaning as he tastes himself on Danny's tongue. Steve then pulls away, lifts his left hand to Danny's mouth, and orders, "Lick."

And wow, okay. Danny's always had a thing for Steve's big strong hands, and he's not averse to following commands in bed either. So really, this is no hardship at all.

Danny paints Steve's palm with broad strokes of his tongue, twisting up and around his fingers too. They're both short of breath by the time he's done.

"Your fucking mouth, Danny," Steve says, almost reverent.

When Steve reaches down and wraps that spit-slicked hand around his cock, Danny groans loudly. The angle is initially awkward, but Steve adjusts his grip and suddenly it's incredible.

"Oh Christ, yes," Danny pants as Steve builds up a steady rhythm, thumb creating perfect pressure just under the head.

Danny's propped up on one fist, watching Steve's hand work his cock so he can commit the unbelievably hot sight to memory. But his wrist is soon shaking too much to support him. When he resettles himself, flat on his side, his face ends up right beside the colorful design on Steve's upper arm. So Danny does what he's wanted to do for months: he licks the tattoo. The muscle beneath the inked skin flexes under his tongue as Steve's hand moves on Danny's cock just right, and he's holding onto his control by a thread now.

"Come for me, Danny – I want to see you," Steve says, voice low and commanding, and Jesus fuck, it's all too much for Danny to take. He gasps and shudders, back arching as his come coats Steve's hand and hip.

"So good, Steve," is all Danny can say. He rolls onto his back and they lie there together, breathing hard. Danny feels like he could never get enough of Steve, now he's had just a taste.

He reaches for Steve's discarded pajamas and wipes their skin clean. Danny feels his eyelids growing heavy, and sees Steve yawning beside him. They can't risk sleeping the afternoon away: the sun isn't due to set until after 6pm, but they shouldn't take any chances. Danny sets the alarm on his phone for 3pm, then picks up Steve's phone and does the same just in case.

Danny pulls the covers up, and settles down again with his head on Steve's shoulder. "We've got time for a nap," he whispers to Steve, who nods drowsily. With Steve safe beside him and holding him close, Danny is soon asleep.

***

Chapter Text

When their phones start beeping an hour later, Danny gets to wake up beside Steve for the first time. Hopefully, it won't be the last. With their bodies still pressed together, they trade soft sleepy kisses for a few minutes.

Danny never wants to leave the warmth and safety of this bed, but being lazy today could literally be the death of him. So he forces himself to pull away, get up, and get dressed.

Steve just wraps a bathrobe around himself. "No point putting clothes on; they'll be torn apart."

"Hey, it could be worse," Danny suggests. "You could be the Incredible Hulk, and have your clothes ripped to shreds every time you got mad."

Steve rolls his eyes, apparently not comforted by this thought.

In the bathroom, Steve sits on the side of the tub while Danny carefully removes his dressings – having them stuck to the skin when he shifts could be painful. In a normal person, the surgical incision surrounding the bullet hole would probably still be red and raw. But because this is Steve, it has faded to a healthy pink color after just eight days. The edges of the wound have knitted together tightly, the dissolvable stitches already absorbed.

Steve's healed so fast, it looks like the shooting happened weeks or even months ago. There's still a chance that his scar could be split open by the transformation, but Danny feels a lot less worried about that now.

He helps Steve downstairs, where they each have another bowl of soup. Danny makes Steve drink a vitamin-enriched power shake, too, and plenty of water.

Steve looks at the clock once they're done. "I should call Mary and the others, just in case."

"Yeah, about that," Danny says, fidgeting a little. "I really had to fight to keep Chin and Kono away from the house this weekend. So I may have given them the impression that, uh, we were already involved before the shooting."

He's relieved when Steve just shrugs. "Whatever it takes to achieve the objective, right? I'm not ready to come out to everyone, but Chin and Kono are family and I trust them."

"I think a bunch of people already suspect, to be honest – or at the very least, they might've guessed how I feel," Danny admits. "It's not exactly standard cop behavior to sleep in your injured partner's hospital room."

Steve raises his eyebrows. "You did that?"

"I thought the shooter might attempt to finish the job," Danny says defensively. "It was only for the first three nights, before you woke up."

"Well, I'm glad you had my back." Steve looks thoughtful, and then adds, "Huh. Actually, that explains some of the ICU nurses' comments."

"I can just imagine," Danny says, getting up from the dining table. "My point is: try to sound cranky and totally off-limits to visitors when you talk to Chin and Kono. And they still think we hired that home nursing agency, remember?"

While Danny's washing the dishes, Steve calls Kono and plays the role of bad patient to perfection. Given how often he's been one for real, it's hardly a stretch. He tells her that Danny and the agency nurse are fussing like crazy, even though he's fine.

"But by Monday I'll have convinced Danny to go back to work, and to stop wasting money on caregivers I don't need," Steve claims. "So maybe you could visit then, or on Tuesday. I might be better company after I've had some peace and quiet."

He says pretty much the same thing to Chin, who offers an update on the investigation in return. Steve puts him on speaker, and Danny dries his hands and comes over to listen.

"The Radio Shack's surveillance footage just got couriered over from LA," Chin reports. "Looks like Kono and I have a long weekend ahead of us."

"Happy hunting," Danny tells him. "But make sure you guys take some time off, and enjoy this sunshine after all the rain we've had."

"Will do, brah. Best of luck to you too – sounds like Steve's a real handful as a patient."

"I'm sitting right here!" Steve interjects, mock-offended. Danny grins at him, and heads back into the kitchen to get the steaks out of the refrigerator and fill a pail from the faucet.

Steve does a 180º mood spin to talk to his sister, keeping his tone upbeat as he reassures her that he's healing well and everything's fine. He eventually winds up the call by telling Mary that he loves her. Steve then sits silently for a while, staring out at the ocean.

"Time to go, babe," Danny says quietly.

He unlocks the door to the basement, and they walk down the steps together. Danny switches on the newly-installed ventilation system to get some fresh air circulating, fills the water trough, and lays the raw meat out. Steve grimaces, as if the smell makes him feel ill – or maybe it's the knowledge that he'll soon be devouring it ravenously, despite himself.

It's 4.30 now, just over 90 minutes before sunset, and Danny really should get out of here. He reaches up and cups Steve's face with his hands. Steve touches his forehead to Danny's, closing his eyes and exhaling heavily.

"I'll be right upstairs," Danny promises. "I'm not leaving, or sleeping, or doing anything tonight except watch over you. You got me?"

"Thanks for everything, Danno. You've been amazing," Steve says, and there's a terrible kind of finality in his voice. Danny wishes he could offer an ironclad guarantee that everything will be fine; he wishes he could be sure that Steve's fears were unjustified.

Instead, Danny kisses Steve slow and sweet, putting all his love into it. He pulls back and says, "I'll see you tomorrow, okay?"

"Yeah."

Danny shuts and locks the basement door, grateful that his view of the room is blocked by the layer of foam. If he could see Steve standing there, alone in his padded cell, Danny's not sure he could bear to leave.

He secures the reinforced top door behind him, and goes around the house locking every window and door. Finally, he heads up to the bedroom and opens the box of silver bullets. Danny didn't want to do this earlier, in front of Steve, but now it's crunch time. His hands shake as he loads his gun, holsters it, and pockets the extra rounds.

An escaped werewolf isn't the only threat he faces tonight. There's still a risk that the house might be raided by soldiers sent to neutralize Steve, and maybe Danny too. Lead bullets should work just fine on them, so Danny takes Steve's SIG and spare clips from the bedside drawer and his shoulder rig from the closet. Wearing two holsters for the next 14 hours won't be comfortable, but it's nothing compared to what Steve will be suffering.

***

Danny sets up camp on the couch facing the basement door, laptop, snacks and beverages within reach on the coffee table. He's pretty much ready, now. There's just one last thing he needs to do.

Rachel picks up immediately when he calls. "Hello, Daniel. How's Steve?"

"He's still pretty weak," Danny says, "but glad to be home. How are you guys doing?"

"We're all fine," Rachel says, sounding surprised that he'd bother to ask. "Grace is outside – shall I get her for you?"

"Just wait a minute, please. I...Rachel, I wanted to tell you that you're a really great mom. And I'm sorry things didn't work out between us, but I wish you happiness."

She's silent for a long moment. "You sound like you're saying goodbye. What's wrong?"

Rachel's always been able to read him so well; thank God they're not having this conversation in person.

"I'm fine," Danny claims. "I've just done a lot of thinking this week about what's really important to me. Almost losing Steve was a wake-up call, I guess."

"You love him, don't you," she says softly. It's not a question.

Danny considers lying, but he trusts Rachel with this. "Yes."

"And does he feel the same way?"

"I'm pretty sure, yeah," Danny says. "It's the one positive that's come from the shooting – Steve and I have finally been honest with each other."

"Well, I'm pleased for you both. You deserve to be happy too, Danny."

Danny swallows hard. "Thanks, Rach. Can I talk to Gracie now?"

Grace is breathless when she gets to the phone. "Hi, Daddy."

"Hey, monkey," he says, his mood instantly lifting. "Have you been running a marathon or something?"

"I was in the back yard, playing with Mr. Hoppy," Grace explains.

"Was he running a marathon?"

She laughs. "No! He sat on my lap and I fed him a carrot."

They chat for a while. Grace tells him about the project on dolphins she's doing for school, the chapter book she's just started reading, and the plans for Marisol's party tomorrow. It's all so blissfully normal and safe.

"Sorry, Gracie, I have to go," Danny eventually says. "Uncle Steve came home from the hospital today, and I'm helping to look after him."

"Is he going to be okay?"

Danny bites his lip. "Yeah, I sure hope so. Listen, sweetheart. I want you to remember something, now and always: Danno loves you."

"I know, Daddy," Grace says, serene and sure. "I love you too."

"Thank you. Be good for your mom, okay?"

"I will. Bye, Danno!"

"Bye," he echoes, and then she's gone. Danny slumps back and stares at the ceiling.

He's done everything he can to prepare for the worst; he's lied to practically everyone he knows. Now Danny just has to hope that it'll all be worth it in the end.

***

Danny leans forward and opens his laptop, wanting to check on how Steve's doing. Thanks to some clever work by the security consultant and electrician, Danny doesn't need a separate monitor to watch the CCTV feed. Plugging an AV cable into the laptop and pressing a button brings up a clear image of the basement.

He can see Steve sitting on the pile of blankets in the corner, arms crossed over his chest, gazing blankly at the opposite wall.

Clearing his throat, Danny says, "Steve, can you hear me?"

Steve's head snaps up, and he looks directly at the camera. "Yeah."

"Okay, good. Everything's working, then. You looked pretty zoned out – you want me to leave you alone, so you can meditate or whatever?"

"No!" Steve says immediately. "Please, just...stay. Talk to me."

"Sure, I can do that," Danny says. "Something in particular you want to hear?"

"Anything. Uh – you could tell me about growing up in Jersey?"

It's a real indication of how desperately Steve needs to maintain this last point of connection, since he usually hates it when Danny talks about home. But of the many things Danny's had to do for Steve lately, this is by far the easiest.

Danny starts by describing his folks' two-story weatherboard house on a quiet suburban street. They weren't well-off, especially not with four kids to support, but Ma and Pop always took pride in their home. The backyard was dominated by a big oak tree that Danny, Matt, Rosa and Beth loved to climb. They'd pretend they were kings and queens and it was their castle, or that they were pirates and it was their ship.

He knows that Steve grew up in Hawaii, with just Mary and his parents, so Danny talks about holiday gatherings in the extended Williams-Russo family. The house would fill with relatives, who laughed and argued and ate 'til they couldn't move. As the eldest, Danny was in charge of keeping his younger siblings and cousins entertained. One Thanksgiving, he got in trouble with Ma for teaching the kids poker. But Pop just winked at him, and handed over some pennies to play for.

Danny tells Steve about the pleasures of a real winter, like skating on the pond at the nearby park. Danny wasn't the fastest runner on land, but he was a demon on ice. He and Matt made an excellent offensive duo, perfectly in sync. In pick-up hockey games, every team captain knew not to select one Williams brother without the other.

Always short for his age, Danny learned the hard way how to protect himself both verbally and physically. He got good enough at it to help other bullied kids too. Ma's youngest brother, a local beat cop, watched Danny defuse an impending playground fight when he was nine. Uncle Lorenzo was the first person to suggest a career in law enforcement; that Christmas, he gave Danny a fake badge and some plastic handcuffs.

Steve is leaning against the basement wall, head tipped back, hands loose at his sides, and eyes closed. He's clearly listening, though, because he smiles and winces at all the appropriate moments. Danny's voice is getting hoarse – this monologue has lasted nearly an hour – but he doesn't dare stop. He just cracks opens another can of soda.

Danny goes on to tell Steve about high school, and how playing baseball helped him get girls that wouldn't have looked at him twice otherwise. Then, after a brief hesitation, he talks about the secret crush he developed on his team's star pitcher.

Opening his eyes, Steve nods. "For me, it was wet dreams featuring one of Kukui High's linebackers," he says quietly. It's almost a shock to hear his voice.

It feels so weird to share this incredibly personal stuff via CCTV, but Danny figures that they're not ready to say it face-to-face yet. "Yeah? So when did you first actually date a guy?"

Steve is absent-mindedly scratching his neck, now, and Danny notices his hand trembling. "After Mom died, Dad sent me to live with her sister in San Diego. I didn't join the football team at my new school; I hung out with the geeks instead. Josh was my lab partner for chemistry, and we just clicked. But then he went to Caltech, and I went to Annapolis. Having a boyfriend wasn't really an option, after that."

Shifting position restlessly, Steve wipes sweat off his forehead with the sleeve of his bathrobe. "What about you?"

"College," Danny says. "I joined the gay students' group on campus, and that's how I mostly met guys. My first was another freshman, Ricardo. He wasn't out to his family either, so we kind of bonded over growing up Catholic and queer."

Danny looks out the window, his mind full of bittersweet memories. The sun is nearing the horizon; not long to go now. And it seems that Steve can feel it, down in his cell. Abruptly, he stands up and starts pacing across the floor.

"Tell me what you're experiencing, babe," Danny suggests, trying to keep his voice calm. "Talk me through it."

"My heart's racing, and my skin's prickling with heat." Steve rips off the bathrobe and scratches feverishly at his bare body. "My senses are heightened: your voice is suddenly way louder, and this light is too bright. And fuck, that meat is starting to smell good."

Outside, the sun sinks into the ocean. Inside, Steve sinks to his knees, wrapping his arms around himself and shuddering all over. "It's coming, Danny," he says brokenly. "Oh, God, it hurts so much."

Danny's never heard Steve sound this scared. He feels heartbroken and utterly helpless, but there's one more thing left to say.

"I love you, Steve," Danny tells him. "I am totally, stupidly in love with you. So just hold onto that, okay? Hold on for me, and I'll be here when it's over."

Steve looks up at the camera, mouth open. Then his eyes roll back in his head and he collapses to the floor.

***

Steve convulses, screaming in agony, as his body gradually reshapes itself. Danny's seen a lot of awful stuff in his life, but this goes straight to the top of the list. It's unbelievable...it's unbearable. Danny buries his face in his hands, unable to watch any more. He mutes the laptop's speakers, too, but those terrible sounds filter up from the basement anyway.

The screams fade away at last, and Danny looks at the screen again through a blur of tears. Steve is gone. In his place is a large wolf, six feet long from snout to tail. Its fur is dark brown, almost black, with gray around the muzzle and ears.

The wolf tips its head back and howls, making Danny's skin crawl. It's like a goddamn horror movie come to life, not 30 feet from where he's sitting. Then the creature races around the room, snarling and sniffing at everything.

Danny has seen a lot of nature documentaries with Grace, and he's always admired wolves – they're smart and strong and generally kinda badass. But the reality of having one in the house is another thing entirely. Danny's fucking terrified now, for Steve and for himself; all the precautions they've taken seem pathetically inadequate.

Growling deep in its throat, the wolf hunkers down in front of the feeding bowl and eats most of the raw steaks. Danny shivers as he watches those sharp fangs rip the meat apart, and tries not to imagine what they could do to him. It goes to the water trough, next, and drinks for several minutes straight.

The wolf is a blur of non-stop activity, after that. It paces, it runs, and it throws itself against the walls as if testing the strength of its confines. Most of all, it jumps at the cage door over and over, desperate to escape its prison.

Even with the laptop muted, the thud of a large powerful body against foam-covered metal is audible through the door at the top of the steps. Thank God Danny had thought to pad the steel bars; Steve could have wound up seriously injured otherwise.

Before tonight, Danny had figured that Steve's habit of discussing the wolf as a separate being was a kind of psychological disassociation – like he couldn't accept that it was part of him. Now, though, Danny understands completely. Steve's in there somewhere, sure. But this dangerous creature has hijacked his body, strapped his mind into the back seat, and taken him on a wild ride. For a control freak like Steve, it must be the worst kind of torture.

After a few hours, the wolf seems to accept that it won't get free...or maybe it's just gathering its strength for another all-out assault on the door. It drinks some more water before retreating to the blankets in the corner and sitting down, panting hard.

Danny's been holding himself still all this time, every muscle tensed and ready for action. He stands up and stretches, wincing as his spine pops unpleasantly, and makes a lightning-fast trip to the bathroom.

His stomach's rumbling by the time he gets back to the couch, so he opens a bag of potato chips and starts eating. And down in the basement, the wolf's head snaps up.

Danny freezes. The laptop's microphone is still on, so of course the sound of his chewing would carry. He finishes his mouthful and says, "Steve, can you hear me?"

The wolf remains motionless, looking at the camera, ears pricked forward. He has its attention now, for better or worse.

"I'm gonna feel pretty dumb tomorrow if it turns out you're asleep in there, Steven, but what the hell." Danny opens a bottle of water and takes a gulp. "Okay, so, did I ever tell you about the time I handcuffed my brother to the monkey cage at the zoo?"

And he's off again, talking like his life depends on it – and maybe it does. Danny reminisces about his childhood some more, goes through the weirdest cases he solved in Jersey, and tells every joke he can remember.

He seems to be keeping the wolf calm, at least; it's lying down on its belly now, slow and even breaths interrupted by an occasional yawn. Danny's also trying to keep himself awake. But most of all, he wants to comfort Steve and maintain their connection.

Danny gets onto the inevitable topic of Grace, and skips randomly from memory to memory. His brilliant daughter was already starting to pick out words by age three; their bedtime story session soon became Grace haltingly reading to Danny. The two of them won the three-legged race at the Newark PD's summer picnic when she was five – he still has their first-place ribbon in a box somewhere.

When she was six, Gracie fell out of the oak tree at his folks' place and sprained her wrist. She got a pink bandage and a strawberry lollipop at the ER, so after the initial pain and shock had passed she didn't seem too traumatized. But Rachel was furious when she arrived, blaming Danny for putting Grace in danger and refusing to believe that he and his siblings climbed that tree for years without ever getting hurt.

With a small whine, the wolf lays its head on its front paws. Danny doubts it's an expression of sympathy; the creature's probably bored as hell. Good. He casts around for something he can discuss at great length, without too much mental effort.

Ah, of course, Danny thinks. Baseball.

He starts off with the high school championship game, where his team won and Danny got the MVP award. Pop had to pull a double shift at the firehouse that day, and was so disappointed that he couldn't make it. But Matt borrowed their neighbors' video camera, and filmed the whole game for Pop to see later. They watched that tape so many times that Danny could have recited the stats in his sleep. He never thought he'd be doing it to send a werewolf to sleep, though.

The wolf's eyelids are looking distinctly heavy now. Danny switches to a play-by-play of Game 1 of the '09 World Series, the last baseball game he saw before moving to Hawaii. He describes how it felt to be at Yankee Stadium with 50,000 other people; what it was like to see the First Lady out on the mound with the legendary Yogi Berra; and how Pop, Danny, and Matt screamed themselves hoarse. The fucking Phillies won anyway, but the Yankees took the Series in the end so it worked out okay.

Down in the basement, the wolf starts to snore.

Danny slumps against the couch cushions, beyond exhausted: he's been running his mouth for close to three hours. He wonders, a little hysterically, if he's the first person ever to talk a werewolf into unconsciousness.

He turns up the volume on his laptop, letting the wolf's bizarrely reassuring snores follow him as he heads into the kitchen to make a pot of strong coffee. It's just past midnight, so there's another seven hours 'til dawn. Fuck, Danny wishes this was happening in the summertime instead.

He grabs a pizza from the freezer, and pulls out that pint of cookie dough ice cream while he's at it. If ever there was a time for eating ice cream straight out of the carton, it's tonight.

While waiting for the pizza to cook, Danny pours himself some coffee and stands at the back door. He stares at the full moon, hanging low in the sky and casting a silvery path across the calm water. It's stunningly beautiful; God, he wishes Steve could see it too.

Danny goes to the bathroom, and then rechecks all the locks. From the front door, he can see the two HPD guys sitting in their squad car outside the gate. Danny feels bad about putting them in greater danger than they can ever know, but grateful for the extra protection all the same.

It'd seem weird to those officers if the house stayed lit up all night, so Danny switches off the living room light. The laptop screen will provide enough of a glow to see by. Anyway: if commandos surround the place, it'll be easier to spot them if his eyes are already adjusted to the dark.

Feeling better after pizza, coffee, and ice cream, Danny leans back on the couch and contemplates the slumbering wolf. Is Steve still awake in there, or does his mind automatically switch off when the wolf's does?

There's so much that Danny doesn't understand about this whole lycanthropy thing. Despite his lingering curiosity, he decides not to ask any more questions after tonight. But if Steve needs or wants to talk, Danny will listen.

The wolf sleeps for another few hours, and Danny relaxes just enough to watch some TV. He finds a re-run of an old hockey game – it's the New Jersey Devils vs. the Phoenix Coyotes, because the universe apparently has a twisted sense of humor. Danny divides his attention between the television and the CCTV feed until the wolf starts to stir, then switches off the game (he knows the Devils win, anyway).

Once the wolf wakes up, it devours the rest of the steaks. Then, re-energized, it goes back to running around and trying to escape. Just watching it constantly in motion makes Danny feel worn out, despite all the caffeine and sugar in his system. But he can't afford to let his guard down.

The sun is due to come up around 7am. About an hour beforehand, the wolf begins to howl again. It's as though it can tell that the end is near – that it's about to be tucked away in the recesses of Steve's mind, hopefully for the rest of his long and healthy life.

The last minutes of the night drag horribly. The wolf's cries become even more plaintive and otherworldly. It's not exactly cold inside the house, but Danny's got goose-bumps.

Outside, the sky gradually brightens as the sun rises over the mountains...and finally, finally, the change happens in reverse. The wolf falls to the floor, and shakes like it's having a seizure. But this time, Danny watches every second avidly. This process is something few people have ever witnessed, and – God willing – something he'll never see again.

If it wasn't happening before Danny's eyes, he'd say it was impossible. The wolf's limbs elongate and straighten; the ears, snout, and fangs shrink back to human dimensions; the tail disappears; and the fur is replaced by skin.

Eventually, it's Steve lying there once again, naked and shivering and gasping in pain.

***

Danny takes a deep breath, and leans closer to the laptop's microphone.

"Steve? Can you hear me?"

The silence stretches out, and Danny fears the worst. Does the wolf still have control of Steve's mind, or is he just too traumatized to speak?

Then there's a hoarse cough and a barely audible, "Let me out."

Danny shuts the laptop and goes over to the basement entrance, gun in hand as a safeguard – he can't risk a not-quite-right Steve getting free. He opens the top door, locks it behind him, and then pauses at the bottom of the basement steps. Danny can't see Steve from here, but can hear him panting harshly. It's an animalistic sound.

"Hey, partner, how are you feeling?"

"Pretty bad," Steve whispers, which Danny automatically translates to 'absolutely fucking awful' by normal, non-SEAL standards.

"I just gotta check before I open this door," Danny says. "What was the last thing I told you, before you changed?"

"You said you loved me, and that I should hold onto that." Steve takes a heaving breath, sounding close to tears. "And I did, Danno, I did."

And that's enough to convince Danny: this really is Steve, in full possession of his body and faculties once again. He holsters his weapon, unlocks the cage door, and walks over to Steve who's still curled up on the floor.

"Come on, up and at 'em," Danny says gently. "This is the first day of the rest of your life."

Steve rolls onto his back, and Danny winces at the sight. Steve's face, hands and forearms have taken a battering, despite all the padding. The dark bruises stand out vividly against his pale, sweat-clammy skin, and his eyes are horribly bloodshot.

Danny bends down, carefully helping him up and wrapping the discarded bathrobe around him. Steve sways on his feet, and falls into Danny's arms; Danny almost collapses under his weight.

"Okay, babe, it's over now. You're gonna be all right," he says, stroking Steve's hair. "Let's get you out of here, huh?"

They make slow progress up the steps, Danny murmuring encouragement the whole way. When they reach the living room, Danny says, "What do you need: first aid, breakfast, fresh air, or sleep?"

"Bathroom, then sleep."

Once Danny gets him into bed, Steve immediately curls into the fetal position with a deep groan, like every inch of his body aches.

Fuck, Steve looks terrible. Danny wants to take him to the hospital, but his miraculously healed chest wound – Christ, that scar looks years old now – would raise too many awkward questions.

"You want some Tylenol, or one of the prescription painkillers they sent you home with?"

Steve shakes his head. "Just need a few hours' rest."

"Okay. Sleep well, then." Danny tucks the comforter close around Steve's trembling body. He's planning to head back downstairs to clean up, but Steve grabs his wrist as he's pulling away.

"You must be so tired, Danny," Steve says. "Stay here with me."

God, it's a tempting offer. Danny's weak with exhaustion, but he does a quick mental check first. All the windows and doors are locked, and the basement secured. His gun and Steve's are on the bedside table, within easy reach.

It should be safe to relax his guard, at last.

So Danny strips off his clothes and lies down behind Steve, wrapping one arm around his partner's beautiful, blessedly human body. He presses a kiss to the back of Steve's neck, and closes his eyes.

***

Chapter Text

Danny sleeps for most of Sunday. He surfaces once to find Steve wrapped around him like a possessive octopus, limbs entwined with Danny's and head on his shoulder. Feeling safe for the first time in days, Danny lets Steve's slow, even breathing pull him under again.

The insistent ringing of his phone is the next sound Danny hears, and he almost knocks it off the bedside table before finding the right button.

"Hey, Danny," Kono says. "How's Steve?"

"Sleeping," Danny grumbles, "and I was too until you called." He rolls onto his back and sees Steve watching him, hair mussed up but face alert. Danny figures that military life would condition a person to wake up fast in response to an unexpected sound.

"Sorry, brah, but it is the middle of the afternoon," Kono points out.

"Huh, really?" Danny blinks rapidly as he tries to get it together. "Yeah, we sent the agency nurse home early, and took a nap. Steve's doing pretty well, now, and he's less grumpy than yesterday. But he's still below strength, and he needs his rest."

"So you decided to nap with him? Aww, that's sweet." Kono's tone is affectionate, so Danny bites his tongue instead of sniping at her.

"Anyway," she goes on, "I just wanted to check in. There's one possible hit so far from the Radio Shack security footage: a white male who stole a GPS tracker five days before the same type of device got planted on your car. But we'll keep going back to when the item was first put on the shelf, just to be sure he's our perp. If we don't finish tonight, we'll pick it up in the morning."

"You guys are doing great work," Danny says. "Hopefully I'll be in tomorrow. It should be okay to leave Steve by then."

"Cool. Chin and I are almost seeing double after so many hours of this; we could use a fresh pair of eyes."

They hang up and Danny turns over to face Steve.

"How are you feeling?"

"Good," Steve says, his expression unreadable. Then he shocks Danny by surging forward and wrapping his arms around him, pressing his face to Danny's neck.

"Jesus, Danny, you were incredible – I can't believe you lulled the wolf to sleep. I knew you had the gift of the gab, but that was a fucking miracle! You gave me a time-out I really needed; you kept me safe and sane. I can't even tell you how grateful I am." He takes a choked breath, and holds Danny even tighter.

"Glad I could help," Danny says, overwhelmed by this uncharacteristic flood of emotion.

"Help? Danno, the sound of your voice was like a lifeline. And just knowing you were watching over me, and waiting for me, made the whole ordeal bearable." Steve kisses Danny's throat and whispers, "God, I love you so much."

And Danny knew, or was pretty damn sure, but hearing the words is still a powerful rush. He touches his lips to Steve's forehead. "Yeah, babe. Love you too."

They lie there together quietly, for a while. Getting to have Steve like this almost makes the pain and stress of the last nine days worthwhile. Danny's earned this moment, and he doesn't ever want it to end.

Eventually, though, the prosaic needs of his bladder and stomach present themselves. And Christ knows both he and Steve need a shower.

When Steve shifts position, bringing his erection against Danny's thigh, Danny's breath hitches. But he says, "While that's tempting as all hell, let's deal with some pressing matters first."

He can feel Steve's smile against his skin. "This doesn't feel pressing to you?"

"Sorry, Steven," Danny says. "I have minimum standards for my sexual partners, and you're currently failing both the dental and physical hygiene tests. Plus I'm pretty hungry – how about you?"

"I feel a little queasy from all that raw meat," Steve says, "so I might hold off on eating. Getting cleaned up sounds like a good plan, though."

He rolls out of bed, his usual supple strength restored, and Danny takes a second to drink in the sight of him. The scar on his chest looks like an old injury now, and it's clear that his broken ribs aren't troubling him anymore. Those awful bruises have faded, and his skin is only slightly paler than normal.

Steve looks healthy, or close enough to it, and it's as though some tight knot inside of Danny comes undone. He's kept Steve alive and safe...he's kept his promises.

"I'll start the water running. Come join me if you like," Steve says, walking naked down the hall.

The prospect of showering together is enough to get Danny moving. He borrows Steve's robe and uses the downstairs bathroom, detours to the kitchen for a handful of Pringles and a Twinkie, then heads back upstairs. Danny brushes his own teeth, for the sake of equity, before joining Steve under the shower spray.

The water is hot, the air is steamy, and Steve is naked and hard against him as they kiss. God, it's like one of Danny's fantasies come to life.

Danny lets go just long enough to coat his hands with shower gel, then spreads it all over Steve's skin. Steve stands still and lets Danny wash him, as if he understands Danny's compulsion to remove all traces of the wolf. He even bends his head so Danny can shampoo and rinse his hair.

Once Danny's done, Steve pins him against the shower wall, pressing their bodies together from thigh to chest. "My turn," he says.

Danny tenses instinctively, and then deliberately relaxes his muscles. He's strong but Steve's stronger, and Danny doesn't want to resist anyway – he's willing to give Steve pretty much anything. He's willing to let Steve take it from him, too, if dominating Danny will help restore the sense of control that the transformation stole from him.

Steve smiles a little at his silent submission. He kisses Danny, slow and sensual, while exploring his wet skin with soap-slicked hands: stroking his neck, smoothing down his arms, bracketing his waist, and curving over his hips. Steve maps his body as though he's planning a mission, Danny's responses memorized like signposts for future travel across this terrain.

Danny's trying to keep it together, but he can't help the low, longing moan that escapes when Steve runs two fingertips up his inner thigh and touches his ass for the first time. Danny shamelessly spreads his legs to provide better access. But Steve just teases across the rim of his hole, instead of pressing inside.

Steve has touched him everywhere except where he needs it most, now – Danny is thoroughly clean and unbelievably turned on. "Please," he says. Steve grins, like he was waiting for Danny to beg, and falls to his knees.

"Oh, fuck," Danny chokes, as Steve's warm, wet mouth envelops his cock and just keeps sinking down.

Steve pulls back and sucks at the head, creating such perfect pressure that Danny's legs tremble and threaten to give out. Steve clamps both hands to his hips, helping hold Danny up. Then he swallows Danny's cock down again, and fucking hell, it's like he has no gag reflex at all.

"Jesus Christ," Danny says, chest heaving, and then he just can't keep quiet. He babbles praise and curses, declarations of love mixed with threats of violence if Steve stops. And Steve doesn't stop; he keeps sucking and licking, and blowing Danny's mind, as though there's nothing he'd rather be doing.

It's too much, too good for Danny to last. He gasps out a warning and Steve pulls back, wrapping his hand around Danny's cock and jacking him off.

"Come on my face, Danny," Steve says, voice wrecked, "I want you to." And Danny just gives it up to him, helpless to resist. Groaning deep in his throat, he watches streaks of his come paint Steve's mouth and cheeks.

It's pretty much the hottest thing Danny's ever seen.

Danny slumps back against the wall as Steve turns his head, letting the shower spray wash his face clean before getting to his feet. "So fucking good," Danny says once he can breathe again. Steve kisses him hungrily, rubbing his erection against Danny's hip.

"You wanna fuck me?" Danny asks. "Because I would be okay with that." He's totally desperate for it, in fact, but Steve will figure that out for himself soon enough. Danny has trouble keeping his mouth shut when he's turned on.

"God, yes," Steve says. "I'd like to take it nice and slow, though, in an actual bed. And I just can't wait that long."

Danny kind of loves this revelation that Steve is a closet romantic, determined to make their first time special. He still wants Steve's cock in his ass, right the fuck now, but maybe he can have the next best thing. So Danny twists round in Steve's arms and faces the shower wall, tilting his hips up invitingly.

He looks over his shoulder at Steve and says, "Well then...how about a trial run?"

Steve's eyes darken as he realizes what Danny is offering him. He cups Danny's ass with both hands, squeezing. "Oh, yeah. Practice makes perfect."

He grabs the bottle of shower gel, spreading cool liquid down the cleft of Danny's ass. Danny braces his forearms and drops his head, biting his lip in anticipation.

Chest pressed against Danny's back and arms wrapped around his body, Steve pushes his cock between Danny's ass cheeks until he's riding the slick, tight crease. The pressure against Danny's hyper-sensitized skin feels amazing; judging by the incoherent sounds Steve's making, it's even better for him.

"More," Danny demands. "C'mon, I can take it."

Steve growls wordlessly and picks up the tempo, his cock sliding back and forth across Danny's hole and perineum. Danny leans his head back against Steve's shoulder and reaches one hand up to cup the nape of his neck, wanting to hold his partner as close as possible. Steve sucks at his exposed throat, too lightly to leave a mark, but enough to make Danny shiver.

It's too soon for Danny to get it up again, but pleasure still radiates through him as Steve uses his body to get off.

"Can't wait for you to fuck me," Danny says, giving up any hope of hiding how much he wants it. "God, it's gonna feel fantastic. Your hands all over my skin and your big cock deep inside me, moving just right, making me come so hard I lose my fucking mind."

Steve presses his face to Danny's neck, shaking and moaning as his orgasm hits. His come splashes against Danny's balls and drips down his inner thigh. It's hot and filthy and stunningly intimate.

He stays plastered to Danny for a minute, panting in his ear as he recovers. "Jesus, Danny. Your mouth should be registered as a dangerous weapon."

That's a little rich coming from someone who had fangs only 12 hours ago, Danny thinks, but he won't ruin the afterglow by pointing that out. Instead, he just lifts his face up for a kiss.

Steve rinses them both clean and shuts off the water. As they're drying themselves off, Danny grins at Steve. "You and me, babe, we're gonna blow the goddamn roof off once we get to the actual sex part."

"Hell," Steve says, deadpan, "and I just spent a fortune on house renovations."

***

Steve has regained his appetite, now, so once they're dressed they head down to the kitchen. Danny starts putting a meal together: leftover soup, a loaf of garlic bread he found at the back of the freezer, and a simple salad.

"I'll go clean up downstairs," Steve says.

"I could do it," Danny offers.

Steve shakes his head. "You handled all the prep – the least I can do is tidy up after myself."

Danny just gives him the keys to the basement, without further argument. He hates the thought of Steve down there alone, again. Still, he understands Steve's need to remove all evidence of his transformation. There's a practical aspect to it, of course, but Danny figures it's psychological too.

Once the food's ready to go, Danny clears away the detritus of his vigil from the living room. He then opens his laptop to check his email while he waits, but finds the CCTV feed still live. Steve is kneeling in the corner where the wolf had slept, his back to the camera. One hand is pressed to the blankets; the other is covering his face. Hating to trespass on this deeply private moment, Danny unplugs the AV cable.

Danny's folks have replied to his email from yesterday. They're pleased to hear Steve is doing well, and grateful for the pictures of Grace. Pop obviously did the typing – he still uses all caps, a relic of years spent producing incident reports on the firehouse's old typewriter – but the tone is entirely Ma. Danny can picture her standing behind Pop, dictating the latest news of relatives and friends.

His sister Bethany has also emailed him back, with proud boasts about her three children and funny stories from the salon she co-owns. God, Danny misses her. The two of them were close as kids, but her husband got transferred to Chicago soon after they married and she could only ever come back to Jersey once or twice a year. Danny's invited her to visit Hawaii, of course, but it's a big ask when money is tight.

If Danny was going to come out to anyone else in his family (Matt's known since high school), it'd be Beth. He's pretty sure she's not homophobic, since her business partner and close friend is an openly gay man. And she calls herself a recovering Catholic, though not within earshot of their folks.

Things with Steve are still too new to make any big announcements, but the thought doesn't scare Danny the way it used to. Maybe he could even be brave enough to tell his parents, someday. Though it'd hurt like hell if they rejected him, at least he'd have a safe haven to retreat to. Hawaii will never be home, but if Grace and Steve are here then Danny's got nowhere else to be.

Steve comes back upstairs, eyes reddened but face composed, and they sit down to eat. Danny doesn't ask how things went in the basement. He doesn't ask for any details about last night either, like how it felt to be a wolf and whether Steve remembers everything Danny said to calm the creature down. If Steve wants to pretend it never happened, then he'll respect that.

But Danny can't ignore the small matter of a squad of commandos that never turned up. He needs to know if that's one worry he can now cross off his mental list.

"Listen, Steve, there's something I don't understand. Wait, let me rephrase that: there are many things about this that I don't understand, but I've learned my lesson about asking you too many questions."

"Hey, no," Steve interrupts, leaning forward. "I was freaked out and angry back in November, but I'm not sorry you figured it out. How could I be, after everything you've risked to help me?"

Danny shrugs that off. "You'd do the same for me. But what would you have done this week, if I hadn't known?"

"Contacted the specialists at Walter Reed," Steve says promptly. "They'd have transferred me to a military hospital with suitable facilities."

Danny nods. "That's kind of my question, actually. When you decided not to ask for help, why didn't a team show up to get you anyway? Or, if they've realized that I know your secret, how come we're both still here?"

"I really don't know," Steve admits.

"Well, can you explain the system to me? The Pentagon must keep tabs on all its werewolves, right?"

"Yeah," Steve says, "someone stationed on the island will be monitoring me." He sounds remarkably okay with that. Steve's entire adult life has been controlled by the Navy, so Danny figures that a lack of privacy probably seems normal to him.

"Is that who planted the bugs?"

Steve shakes his head. "I don't think so. That equipment was far too hi-tech for such a low-level brief. No, my gut says the yakuza's been spying on us. Once I'm back on duty, I want to start digging deeper into their activities here in Hawaii. There must be more going on than we've realized."

"I agree – let's make that a priority," Danny says. "But back to my point: wouldn't your friendly military stalker be aware that you got shot, and understand what that could mean so close to the full moon?"

"Lycanthropy is highly classified, so the local guy wouldn't know why he had to watch me. He'd just report the news of the shooting, followed by updates about my medical status."

This conversation is like getting blood out of a goddamn stone. Still, Danny's thankful that Steve is willing to discuss it at all. "Those reports end up at the Pentagon?"

"Yeah. There's a big research department which handles all kinds of weird classified shit, but the sub-office responsible for managing guys like me is run by just one man. When we go to D.C. for our annual medical check-up, we have to visit him as well. His codename is L-10; it's a play on 'canine', I guess."

Danny's fascinated by the idea of a werewolf-wrangling military bureaucrat. "What's he like?"

"L-10's an older guy, close to retirement. He's pretty decent – he's mostly tasked with keeping our condition under wraps, but he does seem to care about us too. Anyway, he's the one that would have received word of the attack on me."

"So, what: he realized that you'd be unable to take the pills and would have to change last night, and just...left you to it? That doesn't seem strange to you?"

"It does seem unlikely, yeah," Steve says slowly. "I might check into it, see if something's going on."

"Be careful," Danny warns. "If you've managed to fly under the radar this far, don't draw attention to yourself by trying to find out why!"

"'Careful' is my middle name," Steve says, as Danny's taking a sip of water, and then has to slap Danny on the back after he chokes with incredulous laughter.

Just as they're finishing dinner, Chin calls Danny with great news. He and Kono have finished their painstaking trawl through the Radio Shack's surveillance recordings. Only one person appears to have stolen a GPS locator of that kind from that store, during those ten days. Even better, the shoplifter's appearance seems to match what little they know of Steve's shooter.

Chin emails them a still from the security camera feed. The suspect's wearing his ever-present black baseball cap and he keeps his head down, but at least they have a partial picture of his face now. It reveals a man with a strikingly pale complexion, light brown hair, a narrow unshaven jaw, and hazel eyes.

Danny studies the image, frowning. "He looks familiar, but I can't place him."

"Yeah," Steve says, "same for me. It must be someone we've both dealt with before."

"The gunman must have been stalking you before planting the tracker," Chin says. "Maybe you caught a glimpse of him then?"

Danny shakes his head in frustration. "I just don't know. I've got a good memory for faces, but I can't always pinpoint a name or place."

"Don't force it," Chin advises him. "Sleep on it tonight, and we'll start fresh in the morning."

After dinner, the two of them veg out on the couch to watch a DVD. They've done this many times, just as friends. But now Danny can lean against Steve and soak up his body heat, without having to maintain a safe distance. They've both seen Die Hard before, so there's no need to concentrate on the plot; instead, they bicker lazily about which of them is most like John McClane. It's a relaxing end to one crazy rollercoaster of a weekend.

It's late by the time they head back to bed. Danny gets turned on when Steve strips off, because the sight of all that tanned and inked skin would tempt a saint, but he's too tired to actually do anything about it. Steve looks exhausted as well, despite (or because of – who the hell knows) the massive healing boost provided by the transformation.

They lie close together, kisses dwindling in intensity until they're mostly just sharing air. Danny falls asleep with his face inches from Steve's, feeling happier than he's been for a long, long time.

***

He wakes up in an even better mood on Monday, because Steve is mouthing at his balls. When Danny makes an unintelligible noise of surprise and pleasure, Steve lifts his head from between Danny's legs.

"Hope you don't mind," he says.

Danny flaps one sleep-heavy hand at him. "Hey, go right ahead. I'll only mind if you don't actually blow me sometime soon."

Steve licks a path up Danny's cock, swirls his tongue teasingly around the head, then opens his mouth wide and gets down to work.

And God, it's just as mind-meltingly good as the blowjob in the shower yesterday; it's even better, because Danny doesn't have to worry about his knees giving out. He can just lie back, head propped up on one folded arm to give him a better view, and bask in sheer sensation.

It's been years since anyone sucked him off by way of saying 'good morning', and Danny gets close to coming embarrassingly fast. He reaches down to touch Steve's cheek, feeling his cock move inside that talented mouth, and it's a visceral thrill that pulls him over the edge. It's too sudden for Danny to give much warning, but Steve just swallows like a pro and licks his lips after.

Steve sits back on his heels, right hand wrapped around his erection. Danny wants to watch him jacking off, but Christ, he wants to touch him even more.

"Here," he says, "let me help." Steve moves up the bed to kneel at Danny's side, close enough for Danny to reach out and lay one hand over Steve's. Together they work his cock hard and fast.

Steve's eyes are tightly shut as he gets nearer to climax. But they snap open again when Danny says, "Come on me, Steve. I want to feel it hit me, wet and hot – I want to rub it into my skin. C'mon, babe, let me see you come."

Hips jerking uncontrollably and chest heaving, Steve follows orders and shoots across Danny's skin. Danny swirls his fingertips through the spattered liquid as soon as it lands on his belly, and Steve makes a choking sound as the last pulses of his orgasm are wrung from him.

Steve collapses sideways onto the bed, staring as Danny lifts his come-covered fingers to his mouth and sucks them clean. "God, Danny, I had no idea you'd be so dirty."

"Yeah...and? You just got off on it," Danny points out. "Also, I have a very clear memory of you demanding a facial in the shower."

"I guess I'm dirty too, then," Steve says. "Man, sleeping with you is never going to be boring."

"Oh, didn't I tell you? 'Boring' is my middle name."

Steve laughs, and throws a pillow at Danny's head.

***

Chapter Text

Danny is tempted to stay home with his partner today, making up for all the time they wasted secretly pining for each other. There's so much he wants to do to Steve, and even more that he wants Steve to do to him. But Chin and Kono took Five-0 another step closer to the gunman last night, by finding him on that store security footage, and it's time Danny pulled his weight. Steve is able to defend himself now, and the HPD protective detail is still stationed outside the front gate.

So Danny kisses Steve goodbye, and heads to HQ.

Based on Danny's theory that the perp stole the GPS tracker just before boarding a flight from LAX, Chin has gotten hold of the subsequent 24 hours' worth of surveillance from Honolulu airport. Dividing up the arrival gates between them, Danny, Chin and Kono retreat to their individual offices to scrutinize the stream of incoming passengers.

A couple of hours later, Danny is the one who strikes gold. Pausing the footage, he zooms in on someone who's a perfect match to that partial image from the LA Radio Shack. The bastard's not wearing a cap, for once, so he's visible in all his lowlife glory at last.

And Danny's jaw drops, because he was right: he does know that face. Only problem is, the guy's dead.

It was that major drug case, three months ago, when Steve and Danny had gotten cut by flying glass from a shattered car window. Five-0 had been asked to trace the source of a particularly toxic batch of crystal meth, which had killed a dozen people in just a week. Their investigation had led to an industrial-scale lab, the biggest one ever found in Hawaii.

Steve and Danny had approached the run-down warehouse from the street, with Chin and Kono going round the back and HPD guarding the perimeter.

The scumbags running the operation hadn't come quietly, because Danny's life is never that simple. No, they'd used their arsenal of illegal assault weapons and gone down fighting. Chin and Kono took out two men who'd tried to shoot their way to freedom. Taking shelter behind a car, Steve killed one guy who was advancing on their position; Danny then seriously wounded another who was aiming at Steve's head.

It was a sunny afternoon, so Danny got a clear look at the dead bodies before a paramedic led him away to check his skin lacerations. And he'd swear that the man on his computer screen is the one Steve had put down with a bullet to the heart.

Huh. Danny sits back in his chair and stares at the ceiling, his mind racing. Could the gunman be a vampire?

There are several points in favor of this theory, beyond the guy's apparent ability to rise from the dead. He's ridiculously pale, even by mainland standards, and he vanished without trace after fleeing the scene with impressive speed. Also, they've never seen him in daylight. The Radio Shack theft took place after sunset, the perp landed in Hawaii later that night, and both the GPS planting and the shooting occurred under cover of darkness.

Before last November, Danny would have laughed at himself for even considering vampirism as an explanation. But hey...if werewolves are real, then who's to say that all the other horror movie archetypes aren't real too? So before alerting his teammates that he's found the shooter, or doing anything else, Danny asks someone who just might know.

"Hey, Steve, there's something weird here," Danny says as soon as Steve picks up. "I finally got a clear picture of the perp arriving at HNL, and he looks exactly like that meth dealer you shot and killed back in October. So tell me the truth: do vampires exist?"

"Uh, no? Not as far as I know," Steve says.

"Hmm, okay. What about zombies, then?"

"Why – does the guy look like he's hungry for brains?"

"He just looks tired, and maybe a little drunk," Danny says, looking at the screen.

Steve laughs. "Right. So try finding a more prosaic explanation first, then let your imagination run wild."

Danny could point out that his imagination – and his willingness to believe that Steve might be a werewolf – has got the two of them where they are today. But he holds back, since there's a chance that whoever bugged HQ the first time round has been back over the weekend to replace the devices. They'll need to do regular bug sweeps from now on, and improve the security system.

Ending the call, Danny looks up that drug raid...and yeah, there's that same face again. According to the case file, Tyler Martin was born in Hawaii and started his criminal career as a teenager. He was just 24 years old when he got into a gunfight with a SEAL, and lost.

But a little more digging into Tyler's history provides a prosaic explanation, after all. He was survived by a brother named Jonathan, who goes by Johnny. Danny pulls up their DMV records, and: bingo.

Danny calls Steve back with the news, then puts his phone on speaker and carries it out to the computer table. "Hey, I've found our guy! Can you transfer the images on my desktop out here?"

Chin works his magic, bringing up four pictures: the airport surveillance from three weeks ago, the post-mortem photo from three months ago, a Hawaii driver's license and a Minnesota one. Tyler's hair was longer and his skin more tanned, but otherwise Johnny is his doppelganger.

"Whoa," Kono says, "identical twins? I totally did not see that coming." Chin just shakes his head slowly, disbelieving but delighted at the breakthrough.

"I knew I recognized our perp from somewhere," Danny says triumphantly. "Steve killed Tyler Martin in that meth lab shootout a few months back. That gives his brother Johnny one hell of a motive to kill Steve."

Chin has pulled up the case file. "The Martins' cousin Aaron Lee was the meth cook – he's the one Danny wounded that day. He survived, pleaded guilty, and got a reduced sentence after he identified the lab's suppliers. Aaron probably saw Steve shoot Tyler, right?"

"Yeah," Steve says. "He was sheltering behind a wall a few feet away when I put Tyler down. Aaron screamed and came towards us, firing, and that's when Danny shot him."

"So maybe Aaron contacted Johnny from prison, and told him that Tyler's death was an unprovoked execution instead of self-defense," Kono says. "And Johnny came back to Hawaii, determined to get revenge on Steve."

"Okay," Danny says, "let's put together all the info we can find on this guy. I know we're all keen to get our hands on him, but we need solid proof first. Steve, you want to stay on the line while we work this?"

"Nah – I should shower, maybe have some lunch."

"Make sure you keep your bandages dry," Danny orders, since their teammates are still listening.

"I know, I know. God, you're so bossy," Steve whines, playing along.

Danny hangs up on him, and sees Chin and Kono trying not to laugh. He rolls his eyes. "Steve's driving me crazy. Man, I can't wait 'til he's allowed to come back to work."

Kono grins. "Doesn't he drive you crazy on the job too?"

"Yeah, well." Danny shrugs. "Once he's healthy again, at least I'll be able to yell at him without feeling guilty."

***

Kono, Chin, and Danny spend the next few hours compiling every bit of data held on Johnny Martin by local, state, and federal authorities.

As they piece his life together, Danny comes to understand why the guy never showed up on Five-0's radar as a suspect in Steve's shooting. Johnny has no criminal convictions, he's lived on the mainland since 2004, and he arrived back in Honolulu using a fake ID.

Before becoming a fulltime lowlife, Tyler Martin only went to high school to deal drugs. It seems like his twin was a decent kid, though, getting good grades and winning every track meet. Johnny left Hawaii on an athletics scholarship to a Wisconsin college, where he took computer studies. But he dropped out in junior year after losing his funding, and got work at a Radio Shack in Minneapolis – which explains why he could so easily circumvent the LA store's anti-theft measures.

Until three months ago, there was no record of Johnny doing anything worse than speeding occasionally. But then Tyler was killed, and Johnny's life came undone. He got arrested twice for DUI, the store fired him for repeatedly showing up late (either drunk or hung-over), and his girlfriend left him after an argument so loud that neighbors called the police. And three weeks ago, Johnny moved out of his apartment and flew to Hawaii on a one-way ticket.

Everything points to Johnny...now they just have to find him.

"His father died years ago. But his mom, Fiona, still lives in the family home out in Wai'anae," Kono reports. "That's a pretty rough area."

"I'll organize the warrant," Chin says. "Kono, alert HPD and have them send a couple of cars. We need SWAT, too, just in case. Johnny Martin might give himself up quietly, or he might go down fighting like his twin."

Danny goes into his office to tell Steve what they've found so far, finishing up with, "Johnny's got a Minnesota firearms license. Guess what kind of handgun he owns?"

"A Glock 9mm," Steve says.

"You got it. And Chin checked with shooting ranges in the Minneapolis area: he started showing up for intensive target practice a few weeks before leaving for Hawaii. This is our guy, Steve, I'm sure of it. We're heading out to his mother's place now."

"I'm coming with you," Steve declares.

"Like hell you are," Danny says. "You're recovering from a life-threatening injury, remember? And this guy already tried to kill you once. I don't want you anywhere near that house – promise me, Steve."

"All right, fine. I promise. But call me the minute you find him, okay?"

"You'll be the first to know," Danny assures him. He checks his gun, thankful that he remembered to swap out the silver rounds last night, and gets his bulletproof vest on. Then he heads out to the parking lot to meet Chin and Kono.

Danny stops down the street from a small run-down house, his teammates, two squad cars, and a vanload of SWAT officers pulling up behind him. Johnny Martin must have been smart, determined, and hard-working, if he got out of this crappy neighborhood and went to college. He can never forgive the guy for hurting Steve, but that doesn't stop him from seeing Johnny's downward spiral as a tragic waste.

The front door is opened by a short, rail-thin white woman. Her brown hair is graying, and her hazel eyes are shadowed. She doesn't look at all surprised to find Five-0 on her doorstep, but she just folds her arms when Chin asks about Johnny's whereabouts.

"You monsters took Tyler from me," Fiona Martin says venomously. "I won't help you find my other boy."

"We have a warrant, ma'am," Danny says, loud enough to be heard throughout the house, "and your property is surrounded. Please stand aside while we conduct a search. And if Johnny is here, it'd be a good idea for him to come out with his hands up."

A quick sweep reveals the house to be empty, but the spare room is full of Johnny's stuff. Kono leads Mrs. Martin outside, confiscating her phone so she can't warn her son, while the others search for evidence. The suitcase's airline tags match the fake ID Johnny traveled under, but the inside is labeled with his real name. Under the bed is a TSA-mandated container for transporting a handgun, lying open and empty. Danny snaps photos of everything, and tells the HPD guys to gather Johnny's clothes – including a pair of black gloves – for gunshot residue tests.

The laptop on the desk is running, and there's an email open on the screen. It's from the manager of a local Best Buy, confirming the time of Johnny's job interview this afternoon. Chin gets the computer taken into evidence, in case there's any proof of Johnny tracking Danny's car, and then checks his watch. "He should still be at the store right now."

"Excellent. Let's go gatecrash the party," Danny says as they head back outside.

"Fiona Martin, we're taking you in for questioning regarding the attempted murder of Steve McGarrett," Chin says. She starts shouting at them, obscenities and threats, as she's bundled into the back of a squad car.

Danny's phone rings as he's driving to the electronics store. It's one of the HPD officers who stayed behind to search the Martin house, reporting that a Glock pistol was found in a shoebox under the back porch. Danny thanks her, and asks her to get it to CSU for top priority testing. If they're lucky, a preliminary ballistics report will be done in time for Danny to use it against Johnny during the interrogation.

***

Chin, Kono, and Danny hurry through the Best Buy with the SWAT team close behind. The three of them burst into the office, weapons trained on Johnny as they order him to put his hands up. The store manager cowers back but Johnny jumps to his feet, making an abortive gesture towards the gun he's no longer carrying. Once he realizes there's no way out, though, he bows his head and surrenders.

It's anti-climactic, but at least nobody gets shot this time.

"Jonathan Martin, you are under arrest for the attempted murder of Steve McGarrett," Danny says, cuffing him carefully while reading his Miranda rights slowly. He's not going to jeopardize the case against this asshole with any procedural fuck-ups. Chin tries to calm the poor manager down, Kono leads Johnny out of the building, and Danny makes a quick call to notify Steve of the arrest.

Their return to HQ is delayed by traffic, or what passes for it in Hawaii anyway (Danny's from Jersey, okay...he knows true gridlock). Once they arrive, Kono puts Johnny in an interview room and sits across from him – her silent gaze can be highly unnerving – while Chin stands guard outside.

When Danny heads into his office to gather the necessary files, Steve is already there waiting for him.

"Oh, for fuck's sake," Danny says, throwing his hands up, "did I not make myself clear earlier?"

"Hey, I only promised that I wouldn't come on the raid," Steve says. "I just want to have a conversation with the guy, face to face."

"I get it, Steve, I truly do, but you can't – we have to play this one safe. Do you want your attacker walking free because you gained a confession under duress?"

"I bet you I could get Martin to talk without laying a finger on him," Steve persists.

"Your ability to scare the shit out of people is not in question here," Danny says. "But okay, how's this: if I get nowhere with Johnny, I may mention that you're here and very keen for a reunion."

When Steve opens his mouth to argue, Danny steamrollers right over him. "It's up to me, Steve, you got that? Until you're medically cleared for duty, I'm in charge of Five-0."

After a long moment, Steve grudgingly says, "Fine. Can I at least watch the interrogation?" Danny nods, and gathers up the evidence he'll present to Johnny.

Chin sighs when he sees Steve accompanying Danny. "It's great to have you up and around again, brah, but what part of 'benched' and 'bed rest' did you not understand?"

"Yeah, yeah," Steve says, "Danny already covered that in some detail, trust me. I just couldn't miss the chance to see this for myself."

Danny points him at the observation room, where Steve will be safely separated from the suspect by a one-way mirror. Kono's already in there, and will no doubt offer her own opinion of Steve's pig-headed idiocy. Then Danny walks into the interview room with Chin.

Johnny Martin was already pale, thanks to the harsh Minnesota winter, but he's ghostly white now. Still, his expression is stubbornly set.

"So, Johnny," Danny begins, "is there any chance you'd like to confess now, and save us all a lot of time and trouble?"

When the guy just glares at them, Danny and Chin sit across the table from him and lay out the evidence they've collected. Johnny doesn't speak, but his body language reveals an increasing level of nervousness.

"That Glock we found under the porch at your mom's house? We're getting it tested right now," Danny continues, noting how Johnny licks his lips and shifts in his chair. "And if the ballistics results match the bullet that hit Commander McGarrett, then you're in serious trouble. Juries just love that CSI stuff, man."

Chin leans forward to try a different tack. "Hey, listen. I understand that you're angry about your brother's death –"

"His murder," Johnny spits, breaking his silence at last.

"Actually, no," Danny says immediately, "it was self-defense. We went to the warehouse to arrest your brother, your cousin, and two other guys involved in their meth operation. Instead of surrendering, the four of them opened fire. They were trying to kill us, so we fired back. Steve shot Tyler and I shot Aaron, yes, but we did it to protect ourselves."

Johnny shakes his head. It seems like he's been fed a distorted version of the truth, which he's clinging to as a justification. But he hasn't lawyered up yet, so Danny still has some chance of wearing him down.

Danny asks Chin to go check in with CSU. Once the door closes behind him, Danny says, "You know, Johnny, you really upset a lot of people by shooting Steve. The Governor of Hawaii, for one; we've got her full backing to throw the book at you. But guess who you pissed off the most?"

Johnny's mouth twists into an ugly sneer. "You, for ruining date night with McGarrett? The two of you seemed pretty lovey-dovey at that fancy restaurant. He even dressed up for you, but I guess the bullet hole and bloodstains ruined his nice shirt."

Danny's torn between exultation at this partial admission of guilt – Johnny's just placed himself at the scene of the crime – and seething anger. But the interview is being recorded, and Danny has to keep his cool.

So he just grins, baring his teeth. "You're not my favorite person, that's for damn sure. But no, you pissed off someone much worse than me: Steve. That's Lieutenant Commander Steven McGarrett of the Navy SEALs, to be more precise. You've heard of the SEALs, right? They're the toughest, most badass guys in the US military. And right now Steve's on the other side of that mirror, watching you."

Danny spreads his hands in mock frustration as Johnny swallows hard. "He should be at home recovering from his injuries, but I just couldn't keep him away. I persuaded him not to come in here to interrogate you himself. But he's still my boss, so..."

He trails off, but the implication works – Johnny bites his lip, eyes darting between the mirror and Danny. Then there's a knock on the door, and Johnny shrinks back in fear. Danny's briefly worried that Steve has gotten impatient and overruled him, but thankfully it's Chin instead.

"The ballistics report came back," he announces. "Mr. Martin, test rounds fired from your Glock match the bullet removed from Commander McGarrett's chest and the shell casing found at the scene."

Chin presses his advantage as Johnny's face crumples. "We've got you on first degree attempted murder, Mr. Martin. If you confess now, we could talk to the District Attorney and maybe get you a reduced sentence. But if you go to trial and get convicted, you'll probably spend the rest of your life in prison."

The guy looks like he's wavering, so Danny plays their trump card. "And then there's your mother."

When Johnny's jaw drops, Danny adds, "Oh, didn't I tell you? We took her into custody too, and we'll be questioning her next. She obviously knows what you did – maybe she even urged you to attack Steve. That's aiding and abetting, or even conspiracy to commit murder. But the DA has a lot of discretion in these matters. If you confess now, the charges against your mom might disappear."

Johnny slumps forward with his head in his hands, breathing hard. Eventually, he lifts his face and says, "Yeah, okay. I did it...I tried to kill McGarrett."

Danny smiles at him, encouraging now instead of threatening. "All right. So talk us through it."

Self-incriminating words spill from Johnny's mouth like a dam's been broken. He describes how he brought his handgun with him from Minnesota, stole the GPS locator in LA, and spied on Steve for a few days before planting the device on Danny's car.

Chin interrupts to ask, "Why didn't you monitor Commander McGarrett's truck too?"

"He always seemed to ride in the Camaro," Johnny tells Chin, then glares across at Danny. "Anyway, I knew you were the one who shot Aaron. I wanted to kill McGarrett in front of you, so you'd both suffer. It was even sweeter once I realized he was your boyfriend."

Danny laces his fingers together tightly to stop himself from throttling the homophobic little shit. Chin glances at him, worried, then prompts Johnny to keep talking.

"I tracked you guys for nearly a week, waiting for the right moment. And on the Friday night, I got my chance. The restaurant parking lot seemed perfect: dark, off the street, and with a few possible escape routes via the alleyways and the old tunnels. My cousin grew up in that part of town, so I know my way around. I parked on a street six blocks away, walked back, and waited for you two to come out of the restaurant. Then I fired one shot at McGarrett."

Johnny turns his gaze from Danny to the one-way mirror, his hatred for Steve overcoming his fear.

"But now I wish I'd fired twice...God, I wish I'd emptied all my bullets into you, McGarrett, to make sure you were dead! You murdered my brother, you motherfucking asshole, and I hope you rot in hell."

Johnny slumps back in his chair, eyes wild and chest heaving. Danny feels shell-shocked, and wonders how Steve is reacting next door. He hopes Steve will trust him to handle this, and not storm into the room to confront Johnny.

There's just one more thing Danny wants to ask, but he has to take a deep calming breath before he can speak. "So did you decide to kill Steve as soon as you heard about Tyler's death, or sometime later?"

"About six weeks ago," Johnny says, quieter now. "Before that, all I knew was that Tyler was shot by a cop. When I came home for the funeral, Aaron was in hospital under police guard so I couldn't talk to him. But once he finally got transferred to prison, Mom visited him and heard the full truth. She called and told me what Aaron said, about McGarrett killing Tyler in cold blood when he was trying to surrender."

"Like I said," Danny counters, "that's not what happened. And I can prove it, too, because that meth lab had a security system in place. The cameras mounted on the front wall of the warehouse captured the whole raid on tape. If your cousin hadn't taken that plea bargain, we would've played the footage in court so everyone could see that your twin fired at us first."

Johnny looks devastated. "No – you're lying!"

Chin touches Danny's arm before he can respond. "Go get some air, okay? I'll take it from here."

And part of Danny wants to keep pushing; wants to get a screen set up in here right now, so Johnny can watch the shootout for himself and have his illusions shattered. But Chin's right. Even if he made the guy break down crying, it wouldn't undo what happened to Steve – or to Tyler.

When Danny leaves the room, he finds his partner waiting for him in the otherwise deserted hallway. Steve opens his arms, and Danny walks into an embrace he desperately needs. Listening to Johnny was like having salt rubbed into Danny's still-raw memories: seeing Steve on the ground with a hole in his chest, trying to save him, and begging him not to die.

"You did it, Danno," Steve says. "You found him, and you made him talk. The hard part's over."

They still have to get Johnny's confession formalized, contact the DA about a deal for him and Mrs. Martin, and do God knows how much paperwork. But all that can wait. Danny presses his face to Steve's chest, comforted by the steady beat of his healthy heart.

***

By sunset, the wheels of justice have been set in motion. Johnny and his mother have been transferred to HPD's custody, and the DA will hear from Five-0 at 9am tomorrow.

Chin and Kono offer to go plead the Martins' case, and Danny is grateful he won't have to do it himself. But to Danny's surprise, Steve asks them to seek a lenient sentence for Johnny: five to ten, instead of life without parole.

"I know how I felt after my father was killed," Steve explains. "The drive for revenge drowned everything else out. And the distance between me and Dad, all that time we spent apart, made for a toxic mix of grief and guilt. I would've hunted Victor Hesse down no matter what, with or without the Governor's promise of immunity. So yeah, I understand what Johnny did."

"So can you forgive him?" Danny asks.

"Probably not, but I still think he deserves a second chance."

Kono nods. "What about Fiona?"

"I asked Martin about his mom's role in all this, but he clammed up," Chin says. "Without his testimony, or any hard evidence that she encouraged or helped him, there's not much the DA can do."

"I vote to release her. She's already lost one of her sons, and his brother will be behind bars for years," Steve says. "No punishment the state can hand down would compare to that."

"She'll hate you forever," Danny warns. "You didn't see the way she looked at us today."

Steve shrugs. "A lot of people hate me for a lot less. I have weapons, a kick-ass home security system, a team I trust with my life, and you as my partner. I'll be fine, Danny."

To celebrate a difficult but successful day, they get pizza delivered to HQ. Danny's in such a good mood that he doesn't even rant (much) about the Hawaiian pizza Steve orders and devours with evident enjoyment. It seems like forever since the four of them sat around, laughing and swapping stories; maybe they should make this kind of dinner a weekly thing, for team morale.

As Danny's driving back to the house afterwards, Steve clears his throat and says, "I called Cath this morning."

"Yeah? How'd it go?"

"Okay. She seemed disappointed, but not all that surprised."

"Huh," Danny says. "So you'd already told her how you felt about me?"

"No, but she does know I'm bi and I did talk about you a lot. Cath's a smart woman – I guess she connected the dots."

"Well, I'm glad you could end things on reasonably good terms," Danny says.

"Remarkably good, actually," Steve says. "I needed her help with the L-10 problem, and she gave me what I wanted."

Danny shakes his head in disbelief. "Someone really should bottle this charm of yours. You asked a favor of the woman you just dumped, and she didn't yell or hang up on you?"

Steve shrugs. "Anyway, I thought up an excuse for checking L-10's file. He once told me he served in Vietnam as a young Marine; he was among the personnel helicoptered out of the US Embassy just before Saigon fell. And my father's ship was part of the fleet that received those evacuees."

"Did they meet each other?"

"No idea," Steve says, "but there's no proof they didn't, either. So: I told Cath I'd found a photo of Dad, taken in '75, and that I wanted to find the Marine whose name was scrawled on the back. So she looked him up."

When Steve falls silent, Danny prompts him. "And?"

"And he's dead, Danny. L-10 suffered a massive heart attack the day after I got shot."

"Jesus," Danny breathes. "Are you sure that's a coincidence?"

"I'd have to hack into the Pentagon's files myself to double-check. I can believe it, though – he was a heavy smoker, he drank too much, and he'd spent decades behind a desk."

Danny taps his fingertips against the wheel, waiting for the traffic light to change. "So you think his passing explains why you got left alone at the weekend?"

Steve nods. "He ran that office like it was his own little kingdom, and only had a junior aide to do the filing. Nobody else could have stepped into his shoes and immediately understood what was going on. So maybe the reports about me did make it to the Pentagon, but got buried in an overflowing in-tray."

"Well, I'm sorry the guy's dead, but thank God for his timing," Danny says, taking the turn-off for Steve's street.

"It doesn't mean we're out of the woods," Steve cautions. "Sooner or later his successor will clear the backlog of paperwork, and start asking questions. But for now I think we can relax a little."

"So we caught the guy who tried to kill you, and we know why the Pentagon didn't send anyone to get you afterwards," Danny says. "Not bad work, for a Monday. Any other problems you want to solve, while we're on a roll here?"

Steve grins. "Let's try one last puzzle. We're about to arrive at my house, where there's a nice big bed and a good supply of condoms and lube upstairs. I really want to fuck you, and you've expressed an interest in getting fucked by me. So: your thoughts, Detective Williams?"

Danny's hands tighten reflexively on the wheel as he turns into the driveway. "Yes," he says. "Christ, I want you so much." As soon as the car stops, Steve leans across to kiss him and Danny meets him half-way.

***

They eventually make it to the front door, where Danny enters the alarm code with fingers that are trembling slightly. Grabbing Danny's hand, Steve drags him up to his room, pulls Danny's clothes off, and pushes him down on the bed. And fuck, Danny's cock is already hard – being manhandled like this is such a turn-on for him.

Steve strips, fast and efficient, before covering Danny's body with his own. He reaches down to palm the swell of his ass.

"God, Danny, do you have any idea how hot your ass is? You wear those tight pants every fucking day, just to torture me."

"Like you can talk," Danny says, kissing Steve's collarbone before licking a broad stripe up his neck. "You're all, 'Oh, it's a day ending in a -y, I must take my shirt off!' And I have to look, and not touch."

"You can touch now," Steve says, and Danny grins. He runs his hands down Steve's back, loving the feel of the smooth skin and powerful muscles. Steve's ass is usually hidden by those stupid cargo pants, but it's just as tight and taut as Danny had imagined.

"At least you get to see my chest on a regular basis," Steve says. "I just have daydreams about removing your goddamn tie with my teeth."

"Kinky," Danny murmurs, and Steve's laugh is full of filthy promise.

"Oh, we're just getting started, my friend."

Steve claims his mouth again, deep and thorough, until Danny's head is swimming. Then he lifts up and straddles Danny's thighs, staring down at his body with a predatory grin. Danny swallows hard, and doesn't move.

"Look at you, all laid out for me," Steve says. He splays his hands out and rakes his nails down Danny's chest, slowly. The pressure is just right, too firm to be ticklish and too light to be painful, and Danny's nerve endings spark with sensation.

Steve runs a fingertip over Danny's right nipple and Danny hisses with pleasure; he does it again on the other side, pressing harder, and Danny bucks up into the touch.

"Oh, you like that, huh?"

"Yes," Danny gasps. His nipples have always been a major hot zone, but it feels like forever since anyone gave them enough attention. "Give me more."

"I can do that," Steve says, and he does. Danny shudders when Steve pinches both with his fingertips at once, and then twists. The swirl of Steve's tongue around each nipple in turn makes him moan, and he curses loudly when Steve starts sucking.

Though Steve's cock is leaking pre-come onto Danny's thigh, he seems content to take his time, exploring Danny's skin inch by inch like he could do this for hours. Maybe sometime soon they'll spend all day in bed, taking it slow. But right now Danny is so hard that he's aching, desperate to have Steve inside him.

"Hey, babe? As awesome as this is, I seem to recall you saying something about your cock in my ass."

"Patience," Steve says smugly.

"Steven," Danny says through gritted teeth as Steve sucks at his earlobe, "I've been waiting for this for months. I'm all out of goddamn patience! So would you please just fuck me already?"

Steve mouths along Danny's jaw. "I was hoping for an engraved invitation, but I guess that'll do," he says.

Danny rolls his eyes. "If I could reach, I'd give myself a Sharpie tramp stamp that reads, 'Steve's cock goes here', with an arrow pointing down. Close enough?"

He doesn't miss the way his partner's eyes darken at that. And yeah, doesn't it just figure that toppy, possessive Steve would like the idea of seeing his name on Danny's ass. Steve kisses him, quick and hard, before reaching into the bedside drawer for lube and a condom.

Steve kneels between Danny's legs, slicking up the fingers of one hand and caressing his inner thighs, balls, and perineum. He says, conversationally, "How long since you last got fucked?"

"Since before we met," Danny admits.

"So do I need to take this real slow?" Steve asks as he circles Danny's hole.

Danny hisses out a breath at the tantalizing touch. "No – I use my fingers a lot."

Steve stills, biting his lip, before pushing one lubed finger in. "You put your fingers inside when you're jerking off?"

Christ, Danny had almost forgotten how good it feels to have someone else do this to him. "Yeah," he groans. "Don't you?"

"Never." Steve pulls out and slides two fingers back in, the movement rougher but still tightly controlled. "Tell me how you fuck yourself," he says, using his Commander voice that always makes Danny's heart skip a beat.

Danny could resist, refuse to answer, but this interrogation session is already turning them both on like crazy.

"I use my right hand on my cock," Danny says, short of breath now. "I put the middle finger of my left hand in my ass, then the index finger. Sometimes I use my ring finger too."

Steve's face is flushed, his pupils blown wide. "You want three inside you now?"

"Please," Danny begs, and Steve fills him up. His fingers are long and strong, easily able to reach Danny's prostate, and he's clearly done this enough to know where to find it. But Steve is deliberately holding back, focused on just stretching Danny instead.

"Do you watch porn when you masturbate, Danny?"

"Mostly I just fantasize." Danny feels laid wide open, Steve in charge and demanding these intimate confessions from him. After the week he's had, though, it's a relief to give up control and just obey.

Steve's pumping three fingers in and out now, and it's mind-meltingly good. "Whose fingers are they, in your fantasies?"

"Yours," Danny breathes. "Fuck, Steve, it's always you." Steve makes a low, satisfied sound, and Danny's cock gets even harder in response.

Steve pulls out, wipes his fingers clean, and rolls the condom on with shaking hands. It's a relief to see that his self-possession isn't rock-solid, when Danny's already so close to the edge.

Lining himself up, Steve slowly pushes into Danny. Christ, he's big, but Danny's body is relaxed enough to let him in.

"Fuck," Steve says once he's deep inside, braced on his elbows with his belly pressing against Danny's erection. He's staring down at Danny like he can't quite believe this is real, and Danny knows just how he feels.

"Yes please," he replies, wrapping his arms around Steve's back and clenching his ass around Steve's cock.

Steve's breath hitches. "Oh, you wanna get fucked, huh?"

"If you don't mind," Danny says sweetly, flexing his hips up sharply.

"Should've known you'd be a pushy bottom," Steve says with a wicked grin. But he finally moves, starting with slow, smooth strokes and building up speed. And Jesus fuck, it's as fantastic as Danny had hoped.

The first thrust to hit his prostate makes Danny's whole body jolt, the feeling almost unbearably good. His eyes fall closed as Steve keeps pounding against that sweet spot, each thrust making bursts of light appear behind the lids. He leans down and kisses Danny fiercely, capturing his moans. Steve's abs are providing enough delicious friction against Danny's cock that he'll probably come, untouched, real fucking soon...he's waited too long for this to last.

Steve pulls his mouth away to suck a bruise at the base of Danny's neck, tugging on both his nipples at the same time, and Danny's body convulses with pleasure. He's talking now, but God knows if it's even English coming out – Danny can't hear his own words over the rapid thud of his heart and the growing roar in his head.

One more hard, deep thrust and Danny's gone, swept away by a perfect storm of sensation.

When Danny eventually opens his eyes again, he finds Steve watching him. "So hot, Danny," he murmurs. Steve's hips have stilled but his hard cock is twitching against Danny's prostate, sending sparks through his already sated body. "Even better than I imagined."

Danny stretches his arms above his head, worn out in the best possible way. "You fantasize about fucking me, huh?"

"God, yes," Steve says as he starts to thrust again. He looks pained, now, like he's so damn close to coming but can't quite get there. "Fuck, Danny, can I –?"

When he growls in frustration instead of finishing his sentence, Danny says, "It's okay, Steve. Take whatever you need from me."

"Can you kneel, if I help hold you up?" Steve asks, and Danny nods.

Steve withdraws and sits back on his heels, pulling Danny up off the bed. Danny straddles his thighs and sinks down onto his cock again. "Feels so good, Steve," he says with a long satisfied sigh.

But Danny's next breath catches in his throat, because Steve grabs hold of his arms and pulls them behind Danny's back. Steve wraps one big hand around both wrists, and uses the other to hold Danny close as he fucks up into him.

And...holy fucking hell. Nobody's restrained Danny like this for years; there's been nobody he trusts enough. It's like a switch in his brain gets flipped, sending electricity coursing through him as a long-dormant kink flares to life.

"Yes, Steve," he breathes, "I'm all yours. C'mon, give it to me."

Danny kisses Steve then, deep and dirty, biting his lower lip as he rolls his hips. Steve's thrusts become erratic as he teeters on the brink. He tightens his grip on Danny's wrists, like human handcuffs, and comes inside Danny with a strangled moan.

They collapse back onto the bed, both breathless. Steve pulls out and deals with the condom, before wiping them both clean of lube and come.

"You know, I think that might just have been worth the wait," Danny says.

"Definitely," Steve replies, rolling onto his back and pulling Danny close. "Roof's still intact, though."

"Practice makes perfect," Danny says, yawning.

Steve laughs. "Good thing we've got time then, huh." And Danny knows him well enough to hear what's behind the words – both an uncertain question and an unshakeable promise.

"Yeah, babe," Danny says, kissing the scar on Steve's chest. "All the time in the world."

***