You Came To See It All.
So I am having trouble getting back into the natural rhythm of sleep after three weeks of unemployment. This means that I am tired and cranky, no matter when I go to bed because it takes me an hour to fall asleep and then I don't sleep through the whole night. Part of it is my pinched nerve or whatever it is that's causing numbness in my thigh every time I put my weight on my foot or back because I end up having to toss from side to side to stop the pain and that keeps waking me up.
I will be seeing the doctor next week, so I hope she can figure out what the problem is and then fix it. I need my eight hours of sleep, dammit!
So in the interest of posterity I am posting all my comment fic in one place because I am obsessive like that. It's nothing anything new to most of you, so feel free to skip.
Half The Battle
There is a child. In his bedroom. Playing with his GI Joes. And smiling at him like there is nothing wrong.
No matter how many times Steve blinks or tries to pinch himself awake, the picture doesn't change. Grace is still sitting cross-legged on his bed, his GI Joe figures arranged in a circle around her, while she pours pretend tea into pretend cups and makes them all pretend-sip their pretend tea. His inner ten-year-old is still trying to scream that girls aren't allowed in his room and can't touch his stuff while the rest of him is inanely caught up in the fact that Grace has tied a pink ribbon around Ace's neck, which is just wrong.
"Hi, Gracie," Danny coos at her from beside him, his face beaming with fatherly pride and absolutely no concern that his daughter has desecrated the sanctity of his room and his action figures. His pristine action figures that had only been taken out of the box once.
"What's wrong with this picture?" he asks Danny seriously, his arms folded in front of him as he tries to glare at a five-year-old without seeming like he's glaring at a five-year-old. He's not actually a dick, but Grace is a lot more cunning than she appears to be, and he knows that the GI Joe tea party is just the first volley in what promises to be an all-out war on his personal space.
Danny looks at him with his usual demeanor, half-aggravation and half-confusion. "What? Are you seriously telling me that this bothers you?" He points to Grace just as she leans toward Barbeque and says something completely unintelligible, but clearly amused. "Seriously?" he asks again, his rising vocal inflections warning Steve that any answer other than "of course it doesn't bother me" is going to just reinforce Danny's delusion that Steve is mentally unhinged.
Steve cycles through, and discards, at least a half-dozen responses, from "a man's home is his castle" to "she's touching my stuff," and all he manages to come up with is, "Just. look, I don't. but it's a tea party." In retrospect, that could've sounded a lot better. And less whiny. And maybe like he was a grown-ass man of 35 and not a ten-year-old kid with a bratty sister who is touching his stuff.
Danny takes one look at his face and bursts into laughter, ignoring Steve's furiously whispered threats and the punch Steve lands on his arm when he won't stop laughing. He even falls back against the bedroom wall and slowly slumps down to the floor, holding his belly like everything will fall out if he doesn't hold himself just right. "You are priceless," he finally huffs out when the laughter trickles down to gasping breaths and a few persistent hiccups.
"Shut up," Steve snaps, feeling really stupid when Grace just smiles up at him and waves him over. She looks so much like her dad when she smiles, especially around the eyes, and Steve realizes how fucked he is when he finds himself moving over to his bed to sit down next to her while she eels over to the side to make room for him. It's just that she's a tiny girl version of Danny, he thinks desperately, and he hasn't yet figured out a way to say no to Danny, so he's doomed when it comes to his kid.
"Hi, Steve," she says sweetly, and yeah, he is so fucking boned. This kid already has him wrapped around her finger, and it's only the fifth time he's met her. "Wanna play Tea Party with me?"
"Uh..."
"It's really fun," she promises earnestly, and Steve is really going to punch Danny in the face if he keeps howling with laughter like that. Asshole. Can't he see that Steve's talking to his daughter here?
"Why does Ace have a pink ribbon around his neck?" he finally asks, his voice coming out a bit hoarse, either from shock or fear, he hasn't figured out which yet.
She looks at him like he's defective in some way, and it's eerie how much she looks like her dad when she does that. Steve wonders if that's a Williams thing, or a whatever the hell Rachel's maiden name is thing, or if all little girls look at you like you're an idiot and you should know it. "It's a tie," she says patiently, as if explaining a simple concept to a very stupid person. "This is a fancy tea party, and everyone has to be dressed up." She points to the pretty flower clips in her hair. "See?"
"Right," he says helplessly, feeling flummoxed by how this has suddenly become his life when he wasn't even trying for it.
She holds out her hands like she's offering him something, and it takes a moment for it to click in that she's offering Steve an imaginary cup of tea. "Would you like some tea, Steve?"
He manages to plaster a smile on his face as Danny presses his face against the wall and snickers loudly. "I would love some, Grace," he says through his teeth, and by everything that is sacred and holy, Danny is going to die when this is over with. He takes a sip of air and feels ridiculous for doing so, but the look of delight on Grace's face makes up for his embarrassment. "Mmmm, good."
"See, Mr. Pilot," Grace smiles at one of his figures, "I told you that Steve would want to have tea with us."
"His name is Airborne," Steve says despairingly, his inner ten-year-old screaming it along with him.
Danny is still making choked-off noises of amusement as he gets to his feet, brushing off his pants and hiding his face as close to his chest so that Steve can't see his asshole laughing face. "Well," he says calmly once he has some control over himself, "since I'm not invited to the tea party, I think I'll go get myself a beer."
"Wait," Steve calls out in a panic, "you can't leave me here."
Grace cheerfully waves goodbye. "Don't worry, Daddy, I'll invite you to the next one."
Danny blows her a kiss, looking proud and happy all over again. "You do that, pumpkin. I'll be back in a few minutes, okay?"
"Danny, I swear to God," Steve starts, but Danny just laughs and blows a kiss at him too.
"Be nice to my baby girl, McGarrett. And have fun playing with your dolls," he throws over his shoulder, swaggering out of the room like a gunslinger at high noon. God, Steve hates him.
"They're action figures," Steve yells at his departing figure. "And I know where you live, you--" He pauses as he notices Grace's small, quizzical face looking at him. "--great guy," he finishes in a deflated tone.
"Tea party," Grace says firmly, and Steve sighs and holds up his cup of imaginary tea to continue on with their game. He's got the rest of the day to plan how to get Danny back anyway.
It's A Dad Thing
So they've been doing this thing now, this dinner thing where Danny takes Steve and Grace out to lunch at some local place that Steve swears that Grace will love, and Danny gives in (ungracefully) because he can't say no to Grace. Like literally, he cannot say 'no' to her. Rachel once made him practice saying 'no' in the mirror for an hour so he could tell her that no, she couldn't have a pony, it's Jersey and they lived in a cramped, two-floor walk-up, where were they gonna put it?
The whole plan fell apart when he actually got face-to-face with her and realized he could not tell her no without feeling like a total failure as a father. So instead, he'd had a panic attack when she'd asked him for a pony, and she'd ended up having to talk him down from hyperventilating himself into unconsciousness while Rachel calmly and firmly told her all the reasons that having a pony at this time was not feasible. As a testament to the Williams genes, she'd taken it with remarkable aplomb and let Danny buy her an oversized plushy unicorn to make up for it.
("The horn is magical, honey," he'd said with forced cheer, knowing that she could see right through him because she had her mother's gift for sniffing out bullshit.
She'd just smiled and kissed his cheek. "I know, Daddy," she'd said sweetly and held his hand all the way back home from the carnival.
He thanks God every day for giving him the sweetest little girl in the entire world.)
But anyway, they're doing this dinner thing (not a date, Danny reminds himself, there is not enough fucking liquor in the entire universe for him to deal with Steve's hot mess, and he already lived through this drama in college) every weekend, which was, oddly enough, Grace's idea, and this weekend, it's Zippy's. Danny flat-out refuses to eat at any place that sounds like it has a clown for a mascot and makes you wear stupid hats on your head while they sing embarrassing songs on your birthday, but Steve makes these ridiculous faces that actually make Danny feel bad for saying no, and then Grace gets in on the act with her little orphan Annie face, which is how Danny ends up sitting in a wicker chair with a steaming plate of rice and pork in front of him and a glass of punch by his hand.
It's entirely possible that letting his daughter and his partner team up against him was one of the worst ideas he's ever had. No, wait, that honor still belongs to letting Steve talk him into swimming with the dolphins. Maybe they're cute and sweet with other people, but Danny somehow found the only sociopath dolphin in the whole world and barely got out with his life and his dignity intact. He'd rather go swimming with sharks, and he saw 'Jaws' at a young enough age that it's left a lasting impression on him.
"So, Grace," Steve starts, absently reaching over with his fork and spearing one of Danny's pork pieces because he was clearly raised in a fucking zoo, "tell me all about princesses." Danny doesn't kill him only because Grace's little heart-shaped face lights up as her favorite topic gets introduced and she leans toward him so that he won't miss a single word about all the kinds of princesses she loves.
For all his lack of people skills and his unerring ability to frighten little kids doing normal, everyday things, Steve is actually pretty human around Grace. He talks surfing with her, listens intently when she tells him about ponies and football and why she loves pink, and even manages to smile without frightening innocent on-lookers. Danny is more than slightly stunned by how much Steve loosens up around Grace and how easily he seems to laugh around her. It's damn near a miracle.
Danny's so busy watching Grace gesture animatedly with her hands (shades of her grandfather, he thinks, a man who would be mute if you ever handcuffed him) that he doesn't notice what Steve is doing and starts as a forkful of ahi comes at him at ramming speed. "What the--?"
"Try that," Steve demands, pretty much glaring at Danny until he sighs and opens his mouth to taste the forkful of fish and mango sauce that Steve is shoving at him. It's weirdly sweet and tangy, but it somehow all goes together, and Danny finds himself nodding in approval at it.
"Fine, fine, so maybe not all Hawaiian food is wrong," he admits grudgingly, rolling his eyes when Steve lets out a triumphant whoop. "Look, shut up," he says sourly, stabbing a chunk of pork and pretending it's the fleshy part of Steve's arm, which gets a little confusing and gross when he eats it.
"You liked it," Steve crows, dragging the 'i' out until it sounds like 'liiiiiked', and Danny would swear the man regresses when he's around Grace. "Chin owes me money. He said you'd be spitting it out and wiping your tongue with your tie before eating ahi with mango salsa."
Danny pauses, giving Steve a startled look. "Wait, you--" He pushes his fork at Steve in a meaningful manner, wondering if he could use the insanity defense for the inevitable manslaughter charge that comes with being Steve's partner. "You and Chin," he tries to continue, although his ever-present rage is warring with his urge to be well-behaved and controlled around Grace; he really has no idea which urge will win, which is all part of the joy of being on Steve McGarrett's team.
"You and-- he and you-- money-- bet-- on me," he finally manages to sputter out, censoring every third word that wants out of his mouth because Jesus, kids, there are kids around. And Grace. Grace, his little girl, he cannot swear or punch Steve like he wants because he's a good dad, he is a good dad and she is too young to hear any of the words that want out of Danny's mouth.
Steve, being the low bastard that he is, is laughing hard enough that he has to hold onto the table to stay upright in his chair. "You-- oh, man, you should see your face," he wheezes out, and Danny thinks that no jury in the world would convict him if they knew Steve for longer than five minutes. Seriously.
"I will-- get your-- don't make me--" He stops when he sees Grace look over at the both of them, a curious look on her face as she waits for Danny to continue. Danny bites back all the things he's going to do to Steve that involve yanking his shirt over his stupid face and punching him until he feels better, and just says, "We will talk about this later," through clenched teeth.
"Daddy?"
Plastering a smile on his face, Danny turns to Grace. "Yes, sweetheart?"
She frowns, a little perplexed line between her brows as she takes in the strained smile on Danny's face. "Is something wrong?"
Danny shakes his head. "No, honey, why would anything be wrong?"
"Because you only stutter when Steve's around," she says bluntly, setting Steve off again because the man has no goddamn sense of decorum. "Did you hit your head on something? Do you need a doctor?"
Danny's about to say something, but Steve breaks in with "Doctor," said in this breathy gasp that guarantees that Danny is going to get Kono to break into his high school records so he can find some embarrassing shit on him that he is going to blow up to poster size and hang up all over the office. "I'm fine, Gracie," he sighs, feeling defeated by this entire day. "It's just a dad thing. You'll understand some day when you have kids."
To his credit, Steve muffles his laughter and leans over to pat Danny's shoulder, a hint of sympathy in his eyes. "Which will be when you're forty," he tells Grace with mock solemnity, doing a pretty passable Danny imitation and making Grace giggle into her cupped hand. "Which will also be when you're allowed to date."
"I really don't like you," Danny tells him sincerely, but Steve just waves him off and pushes his plate of ahi toward him.
"You like me," he tells Danny, shamelessly pulling Danny's plate toward him, "you just don't want to. Finish up my ahi, I want more of your rice thing."
Danny spears another chunk of tuna and wonders when he got married again and why he isn't getting any sex out of the deal. Then he watches Steve give Grace a sip of his fruit punch and smile fondly at her as she makes a face and goes back to her milk, and wonders if maybe he wouldn't mind going through that drama all over again.
Let It Ride
They've been trapped in this garage for a good half-hour now, pinned down by gunfire and a distinct lack of exit strategies and exits. Kono's out of ammo and Steve's got maybe a few more rounds left, so they've got to make every bullet count, which means they need a plan. Steve's the leader, but he sucks at planning. He's more of the 'charge in there with guns blazing and sort everything out later', which mostly works, except in situations like this that require finesse and forethought.
Steve's not good at planning ahead in a gunfight. It's why the team seems to always be in gunfights. Kono is starting to think that maybe Danny has a point and Steve just goes out of his way to get into situations like this. Hell, she's starting to think that Chin is right and Steve just gets off on this. Either way, she's not going to make it out of here in one piece if she lets him do all the planning.
Everything in the garage is covered in dark tarps, and most of uncovered machines are half-built cars with the engines off to the side or not yet hooked up, so they can't use those as their exit strategy. Just as well since Kono doesn't know how to hot-wire the new cars with their safety measures; Chin would, but she's stuck with GI Joe who still calls her sometimes to figure out how to work his universal remote.
She nudges Steve to get his attention. "Got any ideas?" she asks, jerking her head toward the door that is currently riddled with bullets from their bad guys.
Steve grimaces, which means he hasn't a fucking clue. "Nothing so far," he admits reluctantly, confirming Kono's suspicions.
She takes a deep breath and thinks about it for a moment, blocking out the sound of yelling and short bursts of gunfire to access every scrap of knowledge she has about garages and chop shops and--
Her eyes open suddenly and lights on a familiar shape under a dark tarp. Crawling over to it, using the line of cars as cover, she yanks the tarp off and exclaims with delight. It's a bike, a 1970 Triumph TR6R that's been rebuilt from the ground up, and it's the most beautiful thing Kono's seen in her life. Chin taught her about bikes when she was old enough to sit on the back of his while he drove her around Honolulu, and she's grown up with a profound appreciation for their power and versatility. That knowledge is definitely going to come in handy right now.
She feels someone watching her and turns around to find Steve staring at her, more specifically, a few inches down from her eyes, a frozen look on his face like he's just seen something he shouldn't have and it's knocked the fight out of him. "What--" she starts, wondering what the hell is wrong with him, and then she notices exactly where he's looking. "Are you staring at my ass?" she hisses in a furious whisper, half-shocked that he picks this time to notice that she's actually female and vaguely flattered that he actually noticed how great her ass is.
Steve's eyes slide away toward the bike. "No," he says too quickly, meaning yes, he was looking at her ass, and she almost laughs because he sounds exactly like Danny when Kono had asked him the same question. She really needs to talk to Chin about not promising a painful death to anyone who looks at her for more than five seconds. "I wasn't looking at-- I was looking at the bike," he mumbles, pointing at it with his gun because clearly, no one has ever taught him about gun safety in all his years of training.
Kono sighs and shakes her head. "We don't have time for this, Commander. We need to get out of here."
Steve gives her a curious look, his panicked denial back-burnered for a moment. "You have an idea?"
"Yeah." She pulls the bike back behind the cars and turns it toward the side wall. "This place," she nods her head to indicate the building around them, "they spent their money on the garage door, but the walls are still flimsy enough to break through if we use enough force."
"What kind of force--?" His eyes widen as he takes in the bike and the sharp smile on Kono's face. "Oh, no, no, no, we are not doing that. Kono, Chin will fucking kill me if I--"
She raises an eyebrow at him. "We either get on this bike and blow through that fucking wall or we won't live long enough for Chin to rip you a new asshole. Sir," she adds politely.
Steve drops his head into his heads, looking like the perfect picture of abject misery, while Kono rolls her eyes and gets on the bike, waiting for him to get over his dramatics while she kickstarts it into life. Jesus, it's not like this is the worst thing they've ever done. That would've been going into the chop shop without back-up, which was, hello, Steve's idea. At least she's getting them out of this.
Finally, he seems to be over his doubts, or at least realizes that in the middle of a gunfight is not the right time to have them, because he gets up, puts the safety on and holsters his gun, and walks over to the bike. "Okay, I'll ride. You get on the back."
"Excuse me?" Kono gives him a look that have brought lesser men to their knees in a millisecond; Steve's a little tougher because he just looks uncomfortable, but doesn't actually back down.
"Kono," he says reasonably, holding his hands out like he knows she'll punch him for even suggesting she can't ride a bike, "when we get out of here, we're going to get shot at, and I'd rather they go through me than--"
"Get on the bike now," she says firmly, jerking her head toward the bike. "I will ride, you can shoot, and if you ever pull this kind of patronizing shit on me again, Chin will be the least of your worries. Sir," she adds belatedly, realizing that she probably shouldn't be talking to her superior officer this way, rules and all of that.
She expects him to be pissed off and insulted, but to her surprise, he's smiling and nodding at her. "Yes, ma'am," he says politely, swinging himself up onto the bike, his thighs alongside hers, one of his hands gently holding her side while the other goes back to get his gun, his chest warm and firm against her back. "Ready?"
She swallows the first thing she wants to say, which is 'God, you smell good' because cordite, sweat, and Old Spice should not turn her on, and instead says, "Ready, sir."
"Let's ride, Kono," and she can hear the excitement in his voice as she rides toward the side wall, right where she'd noticed the compromised structural integrity while Steve had been shooting at bad guys. If they get out of this alive, she promises herself that she's going to Chin to get deprogrammed because she should not be having this much fun in a fucking gunfight, and she should not be having thoughts about anybody on the team, especially Steve.
She is fucked from working with these guys, she thinks as she hears Steve laughing when they punch a hole through the wall. Totally and completely fucked, but God, she loves it, and she ends up laughing along with him as they blow past the bad guys with guns and make it onto the street for the requisite car chase.
We Have The Technology
Kono is the middle of a conversation with Danny when her phone rings. Unlike Danny, who has an almost obsessive need to find unique, movie-related ringtones for everyone in his life (he's already planning the ringtone to use when Grace is finally allowed to have a cellphone, which won't be until she's at least 14, and Kono still thinks that he's delusional if he thinks that Grace is going to let him get away with anything Disney-related when she's a teenager), Kono's phone just has the shrill ring that came with the phone. Look, she's been meaning to change it, but then she got assigned to this team, and between the usual shoot-outs, kidnappings, and weekly terrorist plots, she just hasn't had time.
Kono looks at her phone and sees it's Steve calling (she hasn't picked ringtones for everyone on the team, but she did take embarrassing photos of each guy, and so the picture that pops up for Steve is of him half-asleep in his cup of coffee, and Kono keeps it because Steve hates it so much), so she picks up the phone and apologetically cuts Danny off just as he's saying, "...so then Rachel told me I was a danger to myself, to myself..." and waving his arms about like he's conducting an orchestra, he's so angry.
"Kono," she chirps brightly into the phone, knowing that Steve wouldn't be calling so early if it wasn't an emergency. "What's up, boss?"
"Uh, hey, Kono," Steve says, his voice tinny through her phone, and he sounds vaguely embarrassed, which is surprising. "Listen, I hate to bother you, but--"
"No bother, Commander, how can I help?"
There's a pause, a long, humiliated pause, and Kono wonders if she should start worrying about back-up for Steve. And then: "Do you remember that universal remote that Chin programmed for me?"
"Yes?" she says slowly, exchanging a confused look with Danny who's pointing and mouthing, 'Is that Steve? What's he want?' at her.
"Do you know how to switch it so that it turns on my DVD player and goes to the DVD screen?"
She opens her mouth to speak, but nothing comes out for at least a few moments. "What?" she asks again, sure she's heard wrong.
Steve sounds torn between exasperation and mortification. "I can't figure out which buttons to hit to-- look, Chin did this whole macro thing and he explained it to me, but it's really fucking confusing, and I'm still kinda vaguely drunk from the night before, and--"
"Auxiliary and then two," she blurts out quickly, digging her fingers into her palm so that she doesn't laugh like she wants to. Danny's shooting her curious looks, shaking his head at her amusement and smiling because she's smiling, and she promises with a vague hand gesture to tell him about it once she hangs up the phone.
There's a brief pause where she assumes that Steve's trying it, and then there's a triumphant "Aha!" and the opening roar of the MGM lion. "Thanks, Kono," he tells her quickly and then hangs up before she can respond.
"Oh my God," she laughs as soon as she ends the 'end' button. "Danno, you won't believe what just happened."
Danny makes fun of Steve for two solid weeks after that, and Kono has to leave the room every single time so that she doesn't snort in an undignified manner at the pissy look on Steve's face.
***
Kono knows that this date is going to end in tears and possible her knee in his crotch. She knows it ten minutes into the date, and all that's keeping her from pulling out her gun is that one of her cousins set her up with this guy, so she feels obligated to see it through. Her cousins are never allowed to set her up on a blind date again.
"...it's amazing how many people don't know that much about investment banking," Dullard McGee is telling her, his monotone drone making her consider drowning in her crab soup as a viable alternative, when her phone rings. Steve's sleepy, uncaffeinated face pops up, informing her that her boss needs her help, and she holds up her hand to politely stop the conversation before she falls into a coma from boredom.
"Sorry," she tells him sweetly, "but it's my boss. I have to take this." She clicks on the phone and tries not to let the relief show in her voice. "Hey, Commander, what's up?"
"Kono," and fuck, Steve sounds panicked, making Kono wonder if she should cancel the date early and go provide back-up, "my toaster's trying to kill me."
"What?" she asks in a high-pitched tone, sure she misheard him.
"I put in a slice of bread and pushed the thingy and everything caught on fire and my house is burning down," he yells, making her wince and hold the phone away from her ear.
"What do you want me to do?"
"Help me, goddammit," he says exasperatedly, and if she weren't so relieved to have a legitimate excuse to end this date, she'd be pissing herself laughing. Only Steve, only McGarrett, could be bested by a fucking toaster.
"I'll be right there, boss," she says calmly, doing a good job of not giggling madly over the phone. As she hangs up, she gives her investment banker an apologetic look. "I'm so sorry, but this is police business. I have to go."
"It's all right," he tells her kindly, and she does feel a little bad for lying to him when he's such a nice guy, but God, if she has to listen to one more fact about investment banking and all its branches, she's going to need Danny to call her with a fake emergency so she could leave without any guilt. "Maybe we can reschedule this?"
"Yeah," she says absently, grabbing her purse and almost running out of the restaurant without looking back.
Steve doesn't talk to Danny for a whole day after Danny gives him a toaster for his birthday that says 'idiot-proof' in big letters on the box. Chin laughs himself sick and Kono has to hide out in the women's bathroom every time she sees Steve around the station.
***
Her phone rings in the middle of her trying on a slinky dress at Nordstrom's, a dress that she can probably never afford, but it never hurts to look around, right? Steve's tired face has been replaced by near-constant pissy look that Steve's been wearing for the past month. "VCR?" she asks when she picks up the call.
"iPod," Steve says resignedly. "I can't fucking figure out iTunes."
"Switch to MediaMonkey," she tells him as she turns toward the mirror and looks at her ass. Christ, no, she looks like a bulbous grape in this shade of purple and this cut. "It's better than iTunes and doesn't take up as much memory."
"How do I--"
"I'll be there in half an hour."
"Thanks, Kono."
She smiles and slides out of the dress. She'll go with the hunter green. It's a more flattering cut and she has the perfect jewelry for it and it'll make Danny's eyes pop out of his head when he sees her, which is always fun. "No problem, boss."
There's a hesitant pause and then he says, "Don't tell Danny about this."
She grins and hikes her jeans up, shoving her feet into her shoes again. "I guarantee nothing, Commander."
She can practically hear his sigh over the phone. "I will pay you money to not tell Danny," he begs earnestly, and she has to shove the heel of her hand into her mouth not to laugh.
"We'll negotiate when I get there," she tells him casually, shrugging her shirt back over her head and arms without actually removing her phone from her ear. Danny calls it magic, she just calls it a necessary skill after years of living with tons of family in the house and never having any privacy.
"Extortionist," he snipes.
She grins. "Luddite. I'll see you when I get there, boss." She clicks off the phone before he can say another word and grabs the dress as she leaves the change room. He doesn't know it yet, but Steve's just bought her a genuine Vera Wang. She figures he'll consider it a good price to pay to not have Danny mock him for another month.
She wonders what he's going to do about the fancy digital watch she and Danny got him for his birthday and whether she can change her phone number before he makes the inevitable call.
Don't Stop Believin'
"Leave it on," Steve tells Danny just as he goes to change the channel on the radio. "I like this song."
Danny eyes him sideways, pretty sure this entire exchange is going to be yet more solid evidence in his "Steve is a crazy motherfucker" theory that he's been compiling since he met the guy. "Really?" He sits back in his seat and tilts his head toward Steve, knowing this is going to be more entertaining than whatever bullshit lead they're chasing down right now. "This song? You like this song?"
Steve's got that resigned look on his face that means he knows Danny's going to piss him off in some way, but he doesn't know how to stop it. "Yes," he says slowly, "I like this song."
"Pantera?" Danny asks to clarify because really, Pantera. Out of all the music Steve could be listening to, Pantera? "You like Pantera?"
"Yes," Steve tells him through clenched teeth, the furrow between his brow getting deeper every time Danny asks him "Really?" in a higher-pitched voice. "I like Pantera. What the fuck? What is your issue with them?"
Danny shrugs easily. "I don't have an issue with them. I just never thought you'd be a Pantera fan."
"Really?" Steve briefly glares at Danny, his mouth flattened into a thin, irritated line before he turns back to the road, and Danny thinks he really shouldn't be enjoying this as much as he does. Then again, it's not his fault that Steve is this easy to rile up with just a dubious look and a disbelieving tone of voice. "What's wrong with being a Pantera fan?"
"Other than the fact you're not 14 and pissed off anymore?"
"Oh, fuck you," Steve sighs, bringing the car to a jerky stop as the light turns red. He leans back and giving Danny a pissy look, the one that makes Danny just want to keep poking him until he snaps and starts yelling. (Hey, he never claimed to be above his baser instincts, especially not where Steve McGarrett is concerned.) "What the hell do you listen to anyway, Mr. Music Critic?"
"Okay, one," Danny holds up his hand and counts it off, "you suck at comebacks. And two, I listen to good music. Like, Tom Waits good."
Steve makes a face at him. "You do not listen to Tom Waits, you fucking liar."
"Yes, I do--"
"No, you fucking don't," and Steve sounds pretty sure about that, which aggravates Danny because really, how the fuck does he know? It's not like he has cameras in Danny's shitty apartment and is watching every move he makes. Steve isn't unhinged enough to reach that level of invasive creepiness, Danny's pretty sure of that. Besides, he'd need Chin's help to make it work, and Chin is too much of a stand-up guy to do that shit to Danny.
"You probably listen to Journey," Steve adds just to be a dick, and that's just taking it a step too far.
"Oh, oh--" Danny feels the sharp edge of rage drive straight into his brain at the smug smile on Steve's face, so different from the usual rage he feels that starts off slow and tends to build all day. Danny thinks that only Steve could make him have to classify his various shades of aggravation.
"That is low, motherfucker," he finally tells Steve when he's sure he hasn't had a stroke from suppressing his natural inclination to punch Steve in the face. "Even for you, that is low."
Steve just laughs, looking much too pleased with himself now that he's got one over on Danny. "But I'm not wrong, am I?"
Danny's quiet for a moment. "Look," he says finally, "I know they get a lot of shit, but Journey is a really good--"
"I fucking knew it," Steve howls over Danny's talking, thumping the wheel with both hands as his glee overtakes him. "I knew it. Way to fight the stereotype, Danno."
Danny knows that banging his head against the window won't help, but damn if Steve doesn't make him consider it all the fucking time. "I love how you think The Sopranos is, like, indicative of real life," he says mockingly, ignoring the way Steve is almost bent over the wheel with laughter. "Really. Amazing."
"Don't stop believiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiin'," Steve sings in a terrible falsetto, his voice too warbly and out of tune to do the song justice, and Danny thinks that there should be a law against Steve ever being allowed to sing in public again. It is the death of music when Steve sings, as Danny has found out in recent weeks, because the fucker is just tone-deaf or pitch-stupid or something. Danny's had to push Steve to his knees and shove his cock in his mouth more than once just to get him to stop singing; that this is also really enjoyable is pure coincidence.
For his own sanity, he clamps a hand over Steve's mouth, grinding his teeth when he feels Steve's lips pressing into his palm. "Please," he begs, "stop before I shoot you." He can feel Steve's smile against his skin, the slow curl of his tongue over the lines of Danny's palm, and it is so un-fucking-fair that Danny is this easy around Steve when the guy goes out of his way to piss him off. He keeps trying to even things up, but Steve always has some weird ninja seduction move, like the tongue thing, that makes Danny roll over onto his belly and let Steve fuck him stupid. Fucking SEALs.
They go to their respective corners for a while, Steve concentrating on driving to wherever it is they need to go while Danny fumes silently and tries to come up with more creative ways to say 'fuck you' to Steve. He's just thought that maybe he can Google Translate it to Russian and surprise Steve in the middle of his 'I am Alpha, hear me roar' speech that he always does when he's breaking the law when Steve quietly says, "My dad took me to a Zappa concert when I was a kid." He looks over at Danny and his face is an uneasy mix of emotions, the way it always is when Steve talks about his dad. "I still have all his stuff on vinyl because my dad was a big fan."
"Yeah?" Danny asks softly. He always feels like he's walking a tightrope when it comes to Steve and his dad, never sure which question will push Steve into pushing back and which one he'll just let go.
Steve smiles, looking a little more sad and old than Danny would like. "I like Zappa," he says, answering Danny's unspoken question. "I liked Maiden too."
Danny's sure his eyebrows are as high as his hair right now. "Really? Iron Maiden?"
Steve grins, clearly pleased by Danny's reaction. "Yup, Maiden, Black Sabbath, Mötorhead, Anthrax, all of them."
"Metallica?"
Steve see-saws his hand. "Only the first three albums. I hated everything after that."
"So what, you're a headbanger?" Steve nods and Danny shakes his head. "Man, we used to beat the shit out of guys like you when I was in high school."
Steve makes a rude sound. "Yeah, you're not a walking stereotype."
"Shut up," Danny says automatically. "Did you have the mullet?"
Steve gives him a pained look. "Don't ask."
"Oh my God," Danny cries out, thinking that his birthday came early this year at the embarrassed look on Steve's face, "you did, you totally fucking did, oh my GOD." He grabs his phone from his pocket and starts texting Chin.
"What are you doing?" Steve asks nervously, trying to peer at Danny's phone and drive at the same time.
"Eyes on the road," Danny says absently when he notices the car weaving a little. "And I'm getting Chin to find your high school yearbook so I can see the mullet."
Letting out an outraged squawk, Steve reaches over and tries to grab the phone from Danny, missing it every time because he's still keeping his eyes on the road. "I will literally pay you money to not hit 'send'," he says, sounding pissed off and pleading at the same time.
"Fuck your money," Danny laughs, hitting 'send' as he plays keep-away with his phone. "I wanna see the mullet."
"I hate you," Steve sighs despondently, pulling up to a sleek condo and parking illegally just because he knows he can get away with it.
"You fucking love me," Danny tells him as he undoes his seatbelt and gets out of the car. "I'm the only one who won't actually shoot you for any of the shit you do."
"Chin?"
"Is planning on making it look like an accident."
"Kono?"
"Wants to help Chin."
Steve scowls and gets out of the car, outraged offense evident in every line of his body as he glares at Danny over the top of the car. "Traitors." He looks up at the condo and then at his watch. "So our guy is on the twelfth floor. You wanna grab Thai after we're done with him?"
Danny grimaces. "I don't think my ulcers can handle spicy."
Steve's face crinkles in irritation as he walks up with Danny to the front of the building. "I already told you, you don't have ulcers, and you are not fucking blaming them on me."
"Oh, so you're a doctor now?" Danny makes an expansive gesture, that somehow involves his whole body, to let Steve know just how full of shit he is. "You can diagnose just by looking at someone? Great. Fantastic. That'll save me time and money."
Instead of arguing with Danny, Steve grabs him by the neck and pulls him toward the front door, his thumb and forefinger briefly slipping underneath Danny's collar because Steve is a dick who knows all of Danny's weaknesses and uses that knowledge in unfair ways. "Save the guilt trip for after we talk to this asshole," he murmurs, sounding too good for Danny's peace of mind considering he was butchering Journey ten minutes ago.
"Blowjob," Danny orders, rubbing the spot on his neck where Steve's fingers had brushed. "In your car. After lunch. And you don't get to come until we get home."
"Thai for lunch," Steve says heartlessly, and Danny gives in ungracefully because he can still feel the press of Steve's thumb against his nape.
"Let's go fight crime," he tells Steve, and tries not to worry when Steve gets that manic look in his eyes that means that some poor bastard is going to be dangling off a roof and looking down thirty stories until Steve gets his answers. Some day, they're gonna make a show about this kind of shit and no one's going to believe it's real because no one like Steve should actually exist in the world.
Danny thinks of Steve's tongue against his palm and amends his thought: no one like Steve should exist in the world, but he's glad for the one he's got.
Wore My .44 So Long
"Seriously," Danny says for the fifth time, feeling like his head is going to pop off from the sheer amount of rage he's suppressing, "you lost the key? You lost the fucking key? Seriously?"
Steve gives him a sheepish look, scrubbing his hands over his face like it's all just a bad dream and any second he's going to wake up and none of this will be happening. "Yeah, I'm really fucking sorry, Danno--"
"Oh, no," Danny says through clenched teeth, "no, no, no, you aren't yet, but you will be."
"I just--" Steve looks around the room in a vague panic, thinking that if he just looks harder, he'll find it, despite not finding it the last six times he looked. "Look, we can call Chin--"
"We are not fucking calling Chin," Danny roars, meanly glad when Steve flinches at the volume. "He already threatened to revoke my Netflix privileges after the last time he had to bail us out."
"It wasn't so bad."
Danny gives him a look that says he wished he had the ability to kill with his mind. "We were naked and stuck together," he says aggravatedly, twitching his hands in the handcuffs in an useless attempt to slide them off. He's never learned the trick for getting out of handcuffs; a con offered to teach him once, but he'd stupidly refused, thinking that he was never going to need to learn that skill. That was, of course, before he met Steve.
There are a lot of things that he wishes he knew now that he's met Steve. Getting out of handcuffs is only one of them.
Steve winces as he watches Danny try to struggle out of the cuffs. "At least we aren't naked this time?" he offers hesitantly. "Never mind," he adds quickly when Danny just looks at him. "I'll figure something out." He heads over to his laptop on the desk and opens it up.
"Please," Danny's voice is pained and hoarse, "tell me that you're not fucking Googling how to get me out of handcuffs."
Steve turns his head back to Danny, a dubious look on his face. "Do I have to use that exact sequence of words?"
Danny sighs and drops his head in his cuffed hands, making a low, aggravated sound that's half-sigh and half-groan. "Why is this my life?" he asks no one in particular. "I was good, I did everything right--"
Steve makes a face as he opens up his web browser. "Can we not do the guilt thing again?" he asks as he types in 'handcuffs get out of' into the search engine. "I said I was sorry, like, ten times already."
"I am in handcuffs," Danny yells, his head jerking up so he can give Steve the full effect of his glower. "In your bed. With my boxers on. And you. lost. the. key. Exactly which part of this is going according to your plan?"
Despite himself, and knowing that he really shouldn't, Steve laughs as he looks at Danny, taking in the red, angry face, the wild hair, and the broad chest that's wearing the imprints of his mouth and teeth. "Well, I got you into the handcuffs, didn't I?"
"You are a dead man," Danny snaps, his fingers clenched into fists as he tries to tug apart the handcuffs again. "You are such a fucking dead-- I am never having sex with you again."
"Liar," Steve says easily, clicking on the first link and hoping that it has the answer.
"No more blowjobs ever," Danny continues, sounding more agitated and furious as Steve continues reading advice from the forum he's on. "No handjobs, no rimjobs, no-- you are never even touching me again, do you hear me?"
Steve pauses as Danny's words sink in. "No rimjobs?" he asks quietly.
"Ever," Danny tells him seriously.
"Fuck it." Steve flips down his laptop and heads out toward the kitchen. "Be back in a minute."
"Wait, what, what are you--" Danny watches wide-eyed as Steve walks out the door. "If you get a blowtorch, I'm leaving," he yells at the departing figure, trying not to breathe a sigh of relief when Steve's head pops back in the bedroom door.
"Handsaw?" Steve asks.
"No."
"Hammer and chisel."
"No."
"Railroad tracks."
Danny makes a face at him. "Fuck, no. Where do you think we live, the movies? I got news for you, pal: we don't."
Steve grins at him. "I was thinking more like in the cartoons."
"I will shoot you," Danny threatens, his hands waving about like angry birds in flight despite being cuffed to the railings.
Steve shrugs and looks apologetic. "Then Chin's our only bet."
Danny groans and pushes his head back into the headboard of Steve's bed, his hands dangling limply from the cuffs as he tries to figure out which would actually kill him: the humiliation or Steve's solutions. "I'm getting a hundred pizzas sent to my house, aren't I?" he asks forlornly, and Steve sighs, wishing that for once, things would actually work out like they should when he planned stuff like this.
"Chin's not a pizza kind of guy," he admits reluctantly. "You're looking at high school pictures blown up and hung all over the office or a condom tree."
"I hate my life."
Steve holds up a hand to Danny. "Just-- I'll get Chin. Wait here."
"Where am I gonna go?" Danny yells after him, yanking at the cuffs in frustration and cursing the day he decided it would be a good idea to start having sex with his partner. His male partner. His crazy, reckless, I-don't-think-anything-through male partner who can apparently convince him to put on handcuffs, but never thinks to have the key handy for when Danny needs to get out of them. And now Danny's going to have to spend the rest of the week not looking Chin in the face and hiding in the men's washroom so that he doesn't explode from embarrassment.
Later, it turns out that Steve had a spare key in his closet. Danny doesn't talk to Steve for a whole day and blowjobs are right out for the entire week.
So I suckered vinylroad into writing a wee bit of Steve/Kono for me, which delighted me like you would not believe. Go convince her to write more hot het, especially after last night's episode. It's nessa, Kat. It's very nessa!
Today is a Starbucks day, I think. Maybe I will indulge myself and get a chai latte on the way to work today. And in less than two weeks, I will be on my cruise in SUNLIGHT. I can do this.
I will be seeing the doctor next week, so I hope she can figure out what the problem is and then fix it. I need my eight hours of sleep, dammit!
So in the interest of posterity I am posting all my comment fic in one place because I am obsessive like that. It's nothing anything new to most of you, so feel free to skip.
Half The Battle
There is a child. In his bedroom. Playing with his GI Joes. And smiling at him like there is nothing wrong.
No matter how many times Steve blinks or tries to pinch himself awake, the picture doesn't change. Grace is still sitting cross-legged on his bed, his GI Joe figures arranged in a circle around her, while she pours pretend tea into pretend cups and makes them all pretend-sip their pretend tea. His inner ten-year-old is still trying to scream that girls aren't allowed in his room and can't touch his stuff while the rest of him is inanely caught up in the fact that Grace has tied a pink ribbon around Ace's neck, which is just wrong.
"Hi, Gracie," Danny coos at her from beside him, his face beaming with fatherly pride and absolutely no concern that his daughter has desecrated the sanctity of his room and his action figures. His pristine action figures that had only been taken out of the box once.
"What's wrong with this picture?" he asks Danny seriously, his arms folded in front of him as he tries to glare at a five-year-old without seeming like he's glaring at a five-year-old. He's not actually a dick, but Grace is a lot more cunning than she appears to be, and he knows that the GI Joe tea party is just the first volley in what promises to be an all-out war on his personal space.
Danny looks at him with his usual demeanor, half-aggravation and half-confusion. "What? Are you seriously telling me that this bothers you?" He points to Grace just as she leans toward Barbeque and says something completely unintelligible, but clearly amused. "Seriously?" he asks again, his rising vocal inflections warning Steve that any answer other than "of course it doesn't bother me" is going to just reinforce Danny's delusion that Steve is mentally unhinged.
Steve cycles through, and discards, at least a half-dozen responses, from "a man's home is his castle" to "she's touching my stuff," and all he manages to come up with is, "Just. look, I don't. but it's a tea party." In retrospect, that could've sounded a lot better. And less whiny. And maybe like he was a grown-ass man of 35 and not a ten-year-old kid with a bratty sister who is touching his stuff.
Danny takes one look at his face and bursts into laughter, ignoring Steve's furiously whispered threats and the punch Steve lands on his arm when he won't stop laughing. He even falls back against the bedroom wall and slowly slumps down to the floor, holding his belly like everything will fall out if he doesn't hold himself just right. "You are priceless," he finally huffs out when the laughter trickles down to gasping breaths and a few persistent hiccups.
"Shut up," Steve snaps, feeling really stupid when Grace just smiles up at him and waves him over. She looks so much like her dad when she smiles, especially around the eyes, and Steve realizes how fucked he is when he finds himself moving over to his bed to sit down next to her while she eels over to the side to make room for him. It's just that she's a tiny girl version of Danny, he thinks desperately, and he hasn't yet figured out a way to say no to Danny, so he's doomed when it comes to his kid.
"Hi, Steve," she says sweetly, and yeah, he is so fucking boned. This kid already has him wrapped around her finger, and it's only the fifth time he's met her. "Wanna play Tea Party with me?"
"Uh..."
"It's really fun," she promises earnestly, and Steve is really going to punch Danny in the face if he keeps howling with laughter like that. Asshole. Can't he see that Steve's talking to his daughter here?
"Why does Ace have a pink ribbon around his neck?" he finally asks, his voice coming out a bit hoarse, either from shock or fear, he hasn't figured out which yet.
She looks at him like he's defective in some way, and it's eerie how much she looks like her dad when she does that. Steve wonders if that's a Williams thing, or a whatever the hell Rachel's maiden name is thing, or if all little girls look at you like you're an idiot and you should know it. "It's a tie," she says patiently, as if explaining a simple concept to a very stupid person. "This is a fancy tea party, and everyone has to be dressed up." She points to the pretty flower clips in her hair. "See?"
"Right," he says helplessly, feeling flummoxed by how this has suddenly become his life when he wasn't even trying for it.
She holds out her hands like she's offering him something, and it takes a moment for it to click in that she's offering Steve an imaginary cup of tea. "Would you like some tea, Steve?"
He manages to plaster a smile on his face as Danny presses his face against the wall and snickers loudly. "I would love some, Grace," he says through his teeth, and by everything that is sacred and holy, Danny is going to die when this is over with. He takes a sip of air and feels ridiculous for doing so, but the look of delight on Grace's face makes up for his embarrassment. "Mmmm, good."
"See, Mr. Pilot," Grace smiles at one of his figures, "I told you that Steve would want to have tea with us."
"His name is Airborne," Steve says despairingly, his inner ten-year-old screaming it along with him.
Danny is still making choked-off noises of amusement as he gets to his feet, brushing off his pants and hiding his face as close to his chest so that Steve can't see his asshole laughing face. "Well," he says calmly once he has some control over himself, "since I'm not invited to the tea party, I think I'll go get myself a beer."
"Wait," Steve calls out in a panic, "you can't leave me here."
Grace cheerfully waves goodbye. "Don't worry, Daddy, I'll invite you to the next one."
Danny blows her a kiss, looking proud and happy all over again. "You do that, pumpkin. I'll be back in a few minutes, okay?"
"Danny, I swear to God," Steve starts, but Danny just laughs and blows a kiss at him too.
"Be nice to my baby girl, McGarrett. And have fun playing with your dolls," he throws over his shoulder, swaggering out of the room like a gunslinger at high noon. God, Steve hates him.
"They're action figures," Steve yells at his departing figure. "And I know where you live, you--" He pauses as he notices Grace's small, quizzical face looking at him. "--great guy," he finishes in a deflated tone.
"Tea party," Grace says firmly, and Steve sighs and holds up his cup of imaginary tea to continue on with their game. He's got the rest of the day to plan how to get Danny back anyway.
It's A Dad Thing
So they've been doing this thing now, this dinner thing where Danny takes Steve and Grace out to lunch at some local place that Steve swears that Grace will love, and Danny gives in (ungracefully) because he can't say no to Grace. Like literally, he cannot say 'no' to her. Rachel once made him practice saying 'no' in the mirror for an hour so he could tell her that no, she couldn't have a pony, it's Jersey and they lived in a cramped, two-floor walk-up, where were they gonna put it?
The whole plan fell apart when he actually got face-to-face with her and realized he could not tell her no without feeling like a total failure as a father. So instead, he'd had a panic attack when she'd asked him for a pony, and she'd ended up having to talk him down from hyperventilating himself into unconsciousness while Rachel calmly and firmly told her all the reasons that having a pony at this time was not feasible. As a testament to the Williams genes, she'd taken it with remarkable aplomb and let Danny buy her an oversized plushy unicorn to make up for it.
("The horn is magical, honey," he'd said with forced cheer, knowing that she could see right through him because she had her mother's gift for sniffing out bullshit.
She'd just smiled and kissed his cheek. "I know, Daddy," she'd said sweetly and held his hand all the way back home from the carnival.
He thanks God every day for giving him the sweetest little girl in the entire world.)
But anyway, they're doing this dinner thing (not a date, Danny reminds himself, there is not enough fucking liquor in the entire universe for him to deal with Steve's hot mess, and he already lived through this drama in college) every weekend, which was, oddly enough, Grace's idea, and this weekend, it's Zippy's. Danny flat-out refuses to eat at any place that sounds like it has a clown for a mascot and makes you wear stupid hats on your head while they sing embarrassing songs on your birthday, but Steve makes these ridiculous faces that actually make Danny feel bad for saying no, and then Grace gets in on the act with her little orphan Annie face, which is how Danny ends up sitting in a wicker chair with a steaming plate of rice and pork in front of him and a glass of punch by his hand.
It's entirely possible that letting his daughter and his partner team up against him was one of the worst ideas he's ever had. No, wait, that honor still belongs to letting Steve talk him into swimming with the dolphins. Maybe they're cute and sweet with other people, but Danny somehow found the only sociopath dolphin in the whole world and barely got out with his life and his dignity intact. He'd rather go swimming with sharks, and he saw 'Jaws' at a young enough age that it's left a lasting impression on him.
"So, Grace," Steve starts, absently reaching over with his fork and spearing one of Danny's pork pieces because he was clearly raised in a fucking zoo, "tell me all about princesses." Danny doesn't kill him only because Grace's little heart-shaped face lights up as her favorite topic gets introduced and she leans toward him so that he won't miss a single word about all the kinds of princesses she loves.
For all his lack of people skills and his unerring ability to frighten little kids doing normal, everyday things, Steve is actually pretty human around Grace. He talks surfing with her, listens intently when she tells him about ponies and football and why she loves pink, and even manages to smile without frightening innocent on-lookers. Danny is more than slightly stunned by how much Steve loosens up around Grace and how easily he seems to laugh around her. It's damn near a miracle.
Danny's so busy watching Grace gesture animatedly with her hands (shades of her grandfather, he thinks, a man who would be mute if you ever handcuffed him) that he doesn't notice what Steve is doing and starts as a forkful of ahi comes at him at ramming speed. "What the--?"
"Try that," Steve demands, pretty much glaring at Danny until he sighs and opens his mouth to taste the forkful of fish and mango sauce that Steve is shoving at him. It's weirdly sweet and tangy, but it somehow all goes together, and Danny finds himself nodding in approval at it.
"Fine, fine, so maybe not all Hawaiian food is wrong," he admits grudgingly, rolling his eyes when Steve lets out a triumphant whoop. "Look, shut up," he says sourly, stabbing a chunk of pork and pretending it's the fleshy part of Steve's arm, which gets a little confusing and gross when he eats it.
"You liked it," Steve crows, dragging the 'i' out until it sounds like 'liiiiiked', and Danny would swear the man regresses when he's around Grace. "Chin owes me money. He said you'd be spitting it out and wiping your tongue with your tie before eating ahi with mango salsa."
Danny pauses, giving Steve a startled look. "Wait, you--" He pushes his fork at Steve in a meaningful manner, wondering if he could use the insanity defense for the inevitable manslaughter charge that comes with being Steve's partner. "You and Chin," he tries to continue, although his ever-present rage is warring with his urge to be well-behaved and controlled around Grace; he really has no idea which urge will win, which is all part of the joy of being on Steve McGarrett's team.
"You and-- he and you-- money-- bet-- on me," he finally manages to sputter out, censoring every third word that wants out of his mouth because Jesus, kids, there are kids around. And Grace. Grace, his little girl, he cannot swear or punch Steve like he wants because he's a good dad, he is a good dad and she is too young to hear any of the words that want out of Danny's mouth.
Steve, being the low bastard that he is, is laughing hard enough that he has to hold onto the table to stay upright in his chair. "You-- oh, man, you should see your face," he wheezes out, and Danny thinks that no jury in the world would convict him if they knew Steve for longer than five minutes. Seriously.
"I will-- get your-- don't make me--" He stops when he sees Grace look over at the both of them, a curious look on her face as she waits for Danny to continue. Danny bites back all the things he's going to do to Steve that involve yanking his shirt over his stupid face and punching him until he feels better, and just says, "We will talk about this later," through clenched teeth.
"Daddy?"
Plastering a smile on his face, Danny turns to Grace. "Yes, sweetheart?"
She frowns, a little perplexed line between her brows as she takes in the strained smile on Danny's face. "Is something wrong?"
Danny shakes his head. "No, honey, why would anything be wrong?"
"Because you only stutter when Steve's around," she says bluntly, setting Steve off again because the man has no goddamn sense of decorum. "Did you hit your head on something? Do you need a doctor?"
Danny's about to say something, but Steve breaks in with "Doctor," said in this breathy gasp that guarantees that Danny is going to get Kono to break into his high school records so he can find some embarrassing shit on him that he is going to blow up to poster size and hang up all over the office. "I'm fine, Gracie," he sighs, feeling defeated by this entire day. "It's just a dad thing. You'll understand some day when you have kids."
To his credit, Steve muffles his laughter and leans over to pat Danny's shoulder, a hint of sympathy in his eyes. "Which will be when you're forty," he tells Grace with mock solemnity, doing a pretty passable Danny imitation and making Grace giggle into her cupped hand. "Which will also be when you're allowed to date."
"I really don't like you," Danny tells him sincerely, but Steve just waves him off and pushes his plate of ahi toward him.
"You like me," he tells Danny, shamelessly pulling Danny's plate toward him, "you just don't want to. Finish up my ahi, I want more of your rice thing."
Danny spears another chunk of tuna and wonders when he got married again and why he isn't getting any sex out of the deal. Then he watches Steve give Grace a sip of his fruit punch and smile fondly at her as she makes a face and goes back to her milk, and wonders if maybe he wouldn't mind going through that drama all over again.
Let It Ride
They've been trapped in this garage for a good half-hour now, pinned down by gunfire and a distinct lack of exit strategies and exits. Kono's out of ammo and Steve's got maybe a few more rounds left, so they've got to make every bullet count, which means they need a plan. Steve's the leader, but he sucks at planning. He's more of the 'charge in there with guns blazing and sort everything out later', which mostly works, except in situations like this that require finesse and forethought.
Steve's not good at planning ahead in a gunfight. It's why the team seems to always be in gunfights. Kono is starting to think that maybe Danny has a point and Steve just goes out of his way to get into situations like this. Hell, she's starting to think that Chin is right and Steve just gets off on this. Either way, she's not going to make it out of here in one piece if she lets him do all the planning.
Everything in the garage is covered in dark tarps, and most of uncovered machines are half-built cars with the engines off to the side or not yet hooked up, so they can't use those as their exit strategy. Just as well since Kono doesn't know how to hot-wire the new cars with their safety measures; Chin would, but she's stuck with GI Joe who still calls her sometimes to figure out how to work his universal remote.
She nudges Steve to get his attention. "Got any ideas?" she asks, jerking her head toward the door that is currently riddled with bullets from their bad guys.
Steve grimaces, which means he hasn't a fucking clue. "Nothing so far," he admits reluctantly, confirming Kono's suspicions.
She takes a deep breath and thinks about it for a moment, blocking out the sound of yelling and short bursts of gunfire to access every scrap of knowledge she has about garages and chop shops and--
Her eyes open suddenly and lights on a familiar shape under a dark tarp. Crawling over to it, using the line of cars as cover, she yanks the tarp off and exclaims with delight. It's a bike, a 1970 Triumph TR6R that's been rebuilt from the ground up, and it's the most beautiful thing Kono's seen in her life. Chin taught her about bikes when she was old enough to sit on the back of his while he drove her around Honolulu, and she's grown up with a profound appreciation for their power and versatility. That knowledge is definitely going to come in handy right now.
She feels someone watching her and turns around to find Steve staring at her, more specifically, a few inches down from her eyes, a frozen look on his face like he's just seen something he shouldn't have and it's knocked the fight out of him. "What--" she starts, wondering what the hell is wrong with him, and then she notices exactly where he's looking. "Are you staring at my ass?" she hisses in a furious whisper, half-shocked that he picks this time to notice that she's actually female and vaguely flattered that he actually noticed how great her ass is.
Steve's eyes slide away toward the bike. "No," he says too quickly, meaning yes, he was looking at her ass, and she almost laughs because he sounds exactly like Danny when Kono had asked him the same question. She really needs to talk to Chin about not promising a painful death to anyone who looks at her for more than five seconds. "I wasn't looking at-- I was looking at the bike," he mumbles, pointing at it with his gun because clearly, no one has ever taught him about gun safety in all his years of training.
Kono sighs and shakes her head. "We don't have time for this, Commander. We need to get out of here."
Steve gives her a curious look, his panicked denial back-burnered for a moment. "You have an idea?"
"Yeah." She pulls the bike back behind the cars and turns it toward the side wall. "This place," she nods her head to indicate the building around them, "they spent their money on the garage door, but the walls are still flimsy enough to break through if we use enough force."
"What kind of force--?" His eyes widen as he takes in the bike and the sharp smile on Kono's face. "Oh, no, no, no, we are not doing that. Kono, Chin will fucking kill me if I--"
She raises an eyebrow at him. "We either get on this bike and blow through that fucking wall or we won't live long enough for Chin to rip you a new asshole. Sir," she adds politely.
Steve drops his head into his heads, looking like the perfect picture of abject misery, while Kono rolls her eyes and gets on the bike, waiting for him to get over his dramatics while she kickstarts it into life. Jesus, it's not like this is the worst thing they've ever done. That would've been going into the chop shop without back-up, which was, hello, Steve's idea. At least she's getting them out of this.
Finally, he seems to be over his doubts, or at least realizes that in the middle of a gunfight is not the right time to have them, because he gets up, puts the safety on and holsters his gun, and walks over to the bike. "Okay, I'll ride. You get on the back."
"Excuse me?" Kono gives him a look that have brought lesser men to their knees in a millisecond; Steve's a little tougher because he just looks uncomfortable, but doesn't actually back down.
"Kono," he says reasonably, holding his hands out like he knows she'll punch him for even suggesting she can't ride a bike, "when we get out of here, we're going to get shot at, and I'd rather they go through me than--"
"Get on the bike now," she says firmly, jerking her head toward the bike. "I will ride, you can shoot, and if you ever pull this kind of patronizing shit on me again, Chin will be the least of your worries. Sir," she adds belatedly, realizing that she probably shouldn't be talking to her superior officer this way, rules and all of that.
She expects him to be pissed off and insulted, but to her surprise, he's smiling and nodding at her. "Yes, ma'am," he says politely, swinging himself up onto the bike, his thighs alongside hers, one of his hands gently holding her side while the other goes back to get his gun, his chest warm and firm against her back. "Ready?"
She swallows the first thing she wants to say, which is 'God, you smell good' because cordite, sweat, and Old Spice should not turn her on, and instead says, "Ready, sir."
"Let's ride, Kono," and she can hear the excitement in his voice as she rides toward the side wall, right where she'd noticed the compromised structural integrity while Steve had been shooting at bad guys. If they get out of this alive, she promises herself that she's going to Chin to get deprogrammed because she should not be having this much fun in a fucking gunfight, and she should not be having thoughts about anybody on the team, especially Steve.
She is fucked from working with these guys, she thinks as she hears Steve laughing when they punch a hole through the wall. Totally and completely fucked, but God, she loves it, and she ends up laughing along with him as they blow past the bad guys with guns and make it onto the street for the requisite car chase.
We Have The Technology
Kono is the middle of a conversation with Danny when her phone rings. Unlike Danny, who has an almost obsessive need to find unique, movie-related ringtones for everyone in his life (he's already planning the ringtone to use when Grace is finally allowed to have a cellphone, which won't be until she's at least 14, and Kono still thinks that he's delusional if he thinks that Grace is going to let him get away with anything Disney-related when she's a teenager), Kono's phone just has the shrill ring that came with the phone. Look, she's been meaning to change it, but then she got assigned to this team, and between the usual shoot-outs, kidnappings, and weekly terrorist plots, she just hasn't had time.
Kono looks at her phone and sees it's Steve calling (she hasn't picked ringtones for everyone on the team, but she did take embarrassing photos of each guy, and so the picture that pops up for Steve is of him half-asleep in his cup of coffee, and Kono keeps it because Steve hates it so much), so she picks up the phone and apologetically cuts Danny off just as he's saying, "...so then Rachel told me I was a danger to myself, to myself..." and waving his arms about like he's conducting an orchestra, he's so angry.
"Kono," she chirps brightly into the phone, knowing that Steve wouldn't be calling so early if it wasn't an emergency. "What's up, boss?"
"Uh, hey, Kono," Steve says, his voice tinny through her phone, and he sounds vaguely embarrassed, which is surprising. "Listen, I hate to bother you, but--"
"No bother, Commander, how can I help?"
There's a pause, a long, humiliated pause, and Kono wonders if she should start worrying about back-up for Steve. And then: "Do you remember that universal remote that Chin programmed for me?"
"Yes?" she says slowly, exchanging a confused look with Danny who's pointing and mouthing, 'Is that Steve? What's he want?' at her.
"Do you know how to switch it so that it turns on my DVD player and goes to the DVD screen?"
She opens her mouth to speak, but nothing comes out for at least a few moments. "What?" she asks again, sure she's heard wrong.
Steve sounds torn between exasperation and mortification. "I can't figure out which buttons to hit to-- look, Chin did this whole macro thing and he explained it to me, but it's really fucking confusing, and I'm still kinda vaguely drunk from the night before, and--"
"Auxiliary and then two," she blurts out quickly, digging her fingers into her palm so that she doesn't laugh like she wants to. Danny's shooting her curious looks, shaking his head at her amusement and smiling because she's smiling, and she promises with a vague hand gesture to tell him about it once she hangs up the phone.
There's a brief pause where she assumes that Steve's trying it, and then there's a triumphant "Aha!" and the opening roar of the MGM lion. "Thanks, Kono," he tells her quickly and then hangs up before she can respond.
"Oh my God," she laughs as soon as she ends the 'end' button. "Danno, you won't believe what just happened."
Danny makes fun of Steve for two solid weeks after that, and Kono has to leave the room every single time so that she doesn't snort in an undignified manner at the pissy look on Steve's face.
***
Kono knows that this date is going to end in tears and possible her knee in his crotch. She knows it ten minutes into the date, and all that's keeping her from pulling out her gun is that one of her cousins set her up with this guy, so she feels obligated to see it through. Her cousins are never allowed to set her up on a blind date again.
"...it's amazing how many people don't know that much about investment banking," Dullard McGee is telling her, his monotone drone making her consider drowning in her crab soup as a viable alternative, when her phone rings. Steve's sleepy, uncaffeinated face pops up, informing her that her boss needs her help, and she holds up her hand to politely stop the conversation before she falls into a coma from boredom.
"Sorry," she tells him sweetly, "but it's my boss. I have to take this." She clicks on the phone and tries not to let the relief show in her voice. "Hey, Commander, what's up?"
"Kono," and fuck, Steve sounds panicked, making Kono wonder if she should cancel the date early and go provide back-up, "my toaster's trying to kill me."
"What?" she asks in a high-pitched tone, sure she misheard him.
"I put in a slice of bread and pushed the thingy and everything caught on fire and my house is burning down," he yells, making her wince and hold the phone away from her ear.
"What do you want me to do?"
"Help me, goddammit," he says exasperatedly, and if she weren't so relieved to have a legitimate excuse to end this date, she'd be pissing herself laughing. Only Steve, only McGarrett, could be bested by a fucking toaster.
"I'll be right there, boss," she says calmly, doing a good job of not giggling madly over the phone. As she hangs up, she gives her investment banker an apologetic look. "I'm so sorry, but this is police business. I have to go."
"It's all right," he tells her kindly, and she does feel a little bad for lying to him when he's such a nice guy, but God, if she has to listen to one more fact about investment banking and all its branches, she's going to need Danny to call her with a fake emergency so she could leave without any guilt. "Maybe we can reschedule this?"
"Yeah," she says absently, grabbing her purse and almost running out of the restaurant without looking back.
Steve doesn't talk to Danny for a whole day after Danny gives him a toaster for his birthday that says 'idiot-proof' in big letters on the box. Chin laughs himself sick and Kono has to hide out in the women's bathroom every time she sees Steve around the station.
***
Her phone rings in the middle of her trying on a slinky dress at Nordstrom's, a dress that she can probably never afford, but it never hurts to look around, right? Steve's tired face has been replaced by near-constant pissy look that Steve's been wearing for the past month. "VCR?" she asks when she picks up the call.
"iPod," Steve says resignedly. "I can't fucking figure out iTunes."
"Switch to MediaMonkey," she tells him as she turns toward the mirror and looks at her ass. Christ, no, she looks like a bulbous grape in this shade of purple and this cut. "It's better than iTunes and doesn't take up as much memory."
"How do I--"
"I'll be there in half an hour."
"Thanks, Kono."
She smiles and slides out of the dress. She'll go with the hunter green. It's a more flattering cut and she has the perfect jewelry for it and it'll make Danny's eyes pop out of his head when he sees her, which is always fun. "No problem, boss."
There's a hesitant pause and then he says, "Don't tell Danny about this."
She grins and hikes her jeans up, shoving her feet into her shoes again. "I guarantee nothing, Commander."
She can practically hear his sigh over the phone. "I will pay you money to not tell Danny," he begs earnestly, and she has to shove the heel of her hand into her mouth not to laugh.
"We'll negotiate when I get there," she tells him casually, shrugging her shirt back over her head and arms without actually removing her phone from her ear. Danny calls it magic, she just calls it a necessary skill after years of living with tons of family in the house and never having any privacy.
"Extortionist," he snipes.
She grins. "Luddite. I'll see you when I get there, boss." She clicks off the phone before he can say another word and grabs the dress as she leaves the change room. He doesn't know it yet, but Steve's just bought her a genuine Vera Wang. She figures he'll consider it a good price to pay to not have Danny mock him for another month.
She wonders what he's going to do about the fancy digital watch she and Danny got him for his birthday and whether she can change her phone number before he makes the inevitable call.
Don't Stop Believin'
"Leave it on," Steve tells Danny just as he goes to change the channel on the radio. "I like this song."
Danny eyes him sideways, pretty sure this entire exchange is going to be yet more solid evidence in his "Steve is a crazy motherfucker" theory that he's been compiling since he met the guy. "Really?" He sits back in his seat and tilts his head toward Steve, knowing this is going to be more entertaining than whatever bullshit lead they're chasing down right now. "This song? You like this song?"
Steve's got that resigned look on his face that means he knows Danny's going to piss him off in some way, but he doesn't know how to stop it. "Yes," he says slowly, "I like this song."
"Pantera?" Danny asks to clarify because really, Pantera. Out of all the music Steve could be listening to, Pantera? "You like Pantera?"
"Yes," Steve tells him through clenched teeth, the furrow between his brow getting deeper every time Danny asks him "Really?" in a higher-pitched voice. "I like Pantera. What the fuck? What is your issue with them?"
Danny shrugs easily. "I don't have an issue with them. I just never thought you'd be a Pantera fan."
"Really?" Steve briefly glares at Danny, his mouth flattened into a thin, irritated line before he turns back to the road, and Danny thinks he really shouldn't be enjoying this as much as he does. Then again, it's not his fault that Steve is this easy to rile up with just a dubious look and a disbelieving tone of voice. "What's wrong with being a Pantera fan?"
"Other than the fact you're not 14 and pissed off anymore?"
"Oh, fuck you," Steve sighs, bringing the car to a jerky stop as the light turns red. He leans back and giving Danny a pissy look, the one that makes Danny just want to keep poking him until he snaps and starts yelling. (Hey, he never claimed to be above his baser instincts, especially not where Steve McGarrett is concerned.) "What the hell do you listen to anyway, Mr. Music Critic?"
"Okay, one," Danny holds up his hand and counts it off, "you suck at comebacks. And two, I listen to good music. Like, Tom Waits good."
Steve makes a face at him. "You do not listen to Tom Waits, you fucking liar."
"Yes, I do--"
"No, you fucking don't," and Steve sounds pretty sure about that, which aggravates Danny because really, how the fuck does he know? It's not like he has cameras in Danny's shitty apartment and is watching every move he makes. Steve isn't unhinged enough to reach that level of invasive creepiness, Danny's pretty sure of that. Besides, he'd need Chin's help to make it work, and Chin is too much of a stand-up guy to do that shit to Danny.
"You probably listen to Journey," Steve adds just to be a dick, and that's just taking it a step too far.
"Oh, oh--" Danny feels the sharp edge of rage drive straight into his brain at the smug smile on Steve's face, so different from the usual rage he feels that starts off slow and tends to build all day. Danny thinks that only Steve could make him have to classify his various shades of aggravation.
"That is low, motherfucker," he finally tells Steve when he's sure he hasn't had a stroke from suppressing his natural inclination to punch Steve in the face. "Even for you, that is low."
Steve just laughs, looking much too pleased with himself now that he's got one over on Danny. "But I'm not wrong, am I?"
Danny's quiet for a moment. "Look," he says finally, "I know they get a lot of shit, but Journey is a really good--"
"I fucking knew it," Steve howls over Danny's talking, thumping the wheel with both hands as his glee overtakes him. "I knew it. Way to fight the stereotype, Danno."
Danny knows that banging his head against the window won't help, but damn if Steve doesn't make him consider it all the fucking time. "I love how you think The Sopranos is, like, indicative of real life," he says mockingly, ignoring the way Steve is almost bent over the wheel with laughter. "Really. Amazing."
"Don't stop believiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiin'," Steve sings in a terrible falsetto, his voice too warbly and out of tune to do the song justice, and Danny thinks that there should be a law against Steve ever being allowed to sing in public again. It is the death of music when Steve sings, as Danny has found out in recent weeks, because the fucker is just tone-deaf or pitch-stupid or something. Danny's had to push Steve to his knees and shove his cock in his mouth more than once just to get him to stop singing; that this is also really enjoyable is pure coincidence.
For his own sanity, he clamps a hand over Steve's mouth, grinding his teeth when he feels Steve's lips pressing into his palm. "Please," he begs, "stop before I shoot you." He can feel Steve's smile against his skin, the slow curl of his tongue over the lines of Danny's palm, and it is so un-fucking-fair that Danny is this easy around Steve when the guy goes out of his way to piss him off. He keeps trying to even things up, but Steve always has some weird ninja seduction move, like the tongue thing, that makes Danny roll over onto his belly and let Steve fuck him stupid. Fucking SEALs.
They go to their respective corners for a while, Steve concentrating on driving to wherever it is they need to go while Danny fumes silently and tries to come up with more creative ways to say 'fuck you' to Steve. He's just thought that maybe he can Google Translate it to Russian and surprise Steve in the middle of his 'I am Alpha, hear me roar' speech that he always does when he's breaking the law when Steve quietly says, "My dad took me to a Zappa concert when I was a kid." He looks over at Danny and his face is an uneasy mix of emotions, the way it always is when Steve talks about his dad. "I still have all his stuff on vinyl because my dad was a big fan."
"Yeah?" Danny asks softly. He always feels like he's walking a tightrope when it comes to Steve and his dad, never sure which question will push Steve into pushing back and which one he'll just let go.
Steve smiles, looking a little more sad and old than Danny would like. "I like Zappa," he says, answering Danny's unspoken question. "I liked Maiden too."
Danny's sure his eyebrows are as high as his hair right now. "Really? Iron Maiden?"
Steve grins, clearly pleased by Danny's reaction. "Yup, Maiden, Black Sabbath, Mötorhead, Anthrax, all of them."
"Metallica?"
Steve see-saws his hand. "Only the first three albums. I hated everything after that."
"So what, you're a headbanger?" Steve nods and Danny shakes his head. "Man, we used to beat the shit out of guys like you when I was in high school."
Steve makes a rude sound. "Yeah, you're not a walking stereotype."
"Shut up," Danny says automatically. "Did you have the mullet?"
Steve gives him a pained look. "Don't ask."
"Oh my God," Danny cries out, thinking that his birthday came early this year at the embarrassed look on Steve's face, "you did, you totally fucking did, oh my GOD." He grabs his phone from his pocket and starts texting Chin.
"What are you doing?" Steve asks nervously, trying to peer at Danny's phone and drive at the same time.
"Eyes on the road," Danny says absently when he notices the car weaving a little. "And I'm getting Chin to find your high school yearbook so I can see the mullet."
Letting out an outraged squawk, Steve reaches over and tries to grab the phone from Danny, missing it every time because he's still keeping his eyes on the road. "I will literally pay you money to not hit 'send'," he says, sounding pissed off and pleading at the same time.
"Fuck your money," Danny laughs, hitting 'send' as he plays keep-away with his phone. "I wanna see the mullet."
"I hate you," Steve sighs despondently, pulling up to a sleek condo and parking illegally just because he knows he can get away with it.
"You fucking love me," Danny tells him as he undoes his seatbelt and gets out of the car. "I'm the only one who won't actually shoot you for any of the shit you do."
"Chin?"
"Is planning on making it look like an accident."
"Kono?"
"Wants to help Chin."
Steve scowls and gets out of the car, outraged offense evident in every line of his body as he glares at Danny over the top of the car. "Traitors." He looks up at the condo and then at his watch. "So our guy is on the twelfth floor. You wanna grab Thai after we're done with him?"
Danny grimaces. "I don't think my ulcers can handle spicy."
Steve's face crinkles in irritation as he walks up with Danny to the front of the building. "I already told you, you don't have ulcers, and you are not fucking blaming them on me."
"Oh, so you're a doctor now?" Danny makes an expansive gesture, that somehow involves his whole body, to let Steve know just how full of shit he is. "You can diagnose just by looking at someone? Great. Fantastic. That'll save me time and money."
Instead of arguing with Danny, Steve grabs him by the neck and pulls him toward the front door, his thumb and forefinger briefly slipping underneath Danny's collar because Steve is a dick who knows all of Danny's weaknesses and uses that knowledge in unfair ways. "Save the guilt trip for after we talk to this asshole," he murmurs, sounding too good for Danny's peace of mind considering he was butchering Journey ten minutes ago.
"Blowjob," Danny orders, rubbing the spot on his neck where Steve's fingers had brushed. "In your car. After lunch. And you don't get to come until we get home."
"Thai for lunch," Steve says heartlessly, and Danny gives in ungracefully because he can still feel the press of Steve's thumb against his nape.
"Let's go fight crime," he tells Steve, and tries not to worry when Steve gets that manic look in his eyes that means that some poor bastard is going to be dangling off a roof and looking down thirty stories until Steve gets his answers. Some day, they're gonna make a show about this kind of shit and no one's going to believe it's real because no one like Steve should actually exist in the world.
Danny thinks of Steve's tongue against his palm and amends his thought: no one like Steve should exist in the world, but he's glad for the one he's got.
Wore My .44 So Long
"Seriously," Danny says for the fifth time, feeling like his head is going to pop off from the sheer amount of rage he's suppressing, "you lost the key? You lost the fucking key? Seriously?"
Steve gives him a sheepish look, scrubbing his hands over his face like it's all just a bad dream and any second he's going to wake up and none of this will be happening. "Yeah, I'm really fucking sorry, Danno--"
"Oh, no," Danny says through clenched teeth, "no, no, no, you aren't yet, but you will be."
"I just--" Steve looks around the room in a vague panic, thinking that if he just looks harder, he'll find it, despite not finding it the last six times he looked. "Look, we can call Chin--"
"We are not fucking calling Chin," Danny roars, meanly glad when Steve flinches at the volume. "He already threatened to revoke my Netflix privileges after the last time he had to bail us out."
"It wasn't so bad."
Danny gives him a look that says he wished he had the ability to kill with his mind. "We were naked and stuck together," he says aggravatedly, twitching his hands in the handcuffs in an useless attempt to slide them off. He's never learned the trick for getting out of handcuffs; a con offered to teach him once, but he'd stupidly refused, thinking that he was never going to need to learn that skill. That was, of course, before he met Steve.
There are a lot of things that he wishes he knew now that he's met Steve. Getting out of handcuffs is only one of them.
Steve winces as he watches Danny try to struggle out of the cuffs. "At least we aren't naked this time?" he offers hesitantly. "Never mind," he adds quickly when Danny just looks at him. "I'll figure something out." He heads over to his laptop on the desk and opens it up.
"Please," Danny's voice is pained and hoarse, "tell me that you're not fucking Googling how to get me out of handcuffs."
Steve turns his head back to Danny, a dubious look on his face. "Do I have to use that exact sequence of words?"
Danny sighs and drops his head in his cuffed hands, making a low, aggravated sound that's half-sigh and half-groan. "Why is this my life?" he asks no one in particular. "I was good, I did everything right--"
Steve makes a face as he opens up his web browser. "Can we not do the guilt thing again?" he asks as he types in 'handcuffs get out of' into the search engine. "I said I was sorry, like, ten times already."
"I am in handcuffs," Danny yells, his head jerking up so he can give Steve the full effect of his glower. "In your bed. With my boxers on. And you. lost. the. key. Exactly which part of this is going according to your plan?"
Despite himself, and knowing that he really shouldn't, Steve laughs as he looks at Danny, taking in the red, angry face, the wild hair, and the broad chest that's wearing the imprints of his mouth and teeth. "Well, I got you into the handcuffs, didn't I?"
"You are a dead man," Danny snaps, his fingers clenched into fists as he tries to tug apart the handcuffs again. "You are such a fucking dead-- I am never having sex with you again."
"Liar," Steve says easily, clicking on the first link and hoping that it has the answer.
"No more blowjobs ever," Danny continues, sounding more agitated and furious as Steve continues reading advice from the forum he's on. "No handjobs, no rimjobs, no-- you are never even touching me again, do you hear me?"
Steve pauses as Danny's words sink in. "No rimjobs?" he asks quietly.
"Ever," Danny tells him seriously.
"Fuck it." Steve flips down his laptop and heads out toward the kitchen. "Be back in a minute."
"Wait, what, what are you--" Danny watches wide-eyed as Steve walks out the door. "If you get a blowtorch, I'm leaving," he yells at the departing figure, trying not to breathe a sigh of relief when Steve's head pops back in the bedroom door.
"Handsaw?" Steve asks.
"No."
"Hammer and chisel."
"No."
"Railroad tracks."
Danny makes a face at him. "Fuck, no. Where do you think we live, the movies? I got news for you, pal: we don't."
Steve grins at him. "I was thinking more like in the cartoons."
"I will shoot you," Danny threatens, his hands waving about like angry birds in flight despite being cuffed to the railings.
Steve shrugs and looks apologetic. "Then Chin's our only bet."
Danny groans and pushes his head back into the headboard of Steve's bed, his hands dangling limply from the cuffs as he tries to figure out which would actually kill him: the humiliation or Steve's solutions. "I'm getting a hundred pizzas sent to my house, aren't I?" he asks forlornly, and Steve sighs, wishing that for once, things would actually work out like they should when he planned stuff like this.
"Chin's not a pizza kind of guy," he admits reluctantly. "You're looking at high school pictures blown up and hung all over the office or a condom tree."
"I hate my life."
Steve holds up a hand to Danny. "Just-- I'll get Chin. Wait here."
"Where am I gonna go?" Danny yells after him, yanking at the cuffs in frustration and cursing the day he decided it would be a good idea to start having sex with his partner. His male partner. His crazy, reckless, I-don't-think-anything-through male partner who can apparently convince him to put on handcuffs, but never thinks to have the key handy for when Danny needs to get out of them. And now Danny's going to have to spend the rest of the week not looking Chin in the face and hiding in the men's washroom so that he doesn't explode from embarrassment.
Later, it turns out that Steve had a spare key in his closet. Danny doesn't talk to Steve for a whole day and blowjobs are right out for the entire week.
So I suckered vinylroad into writing a wee bit of Steve/Kono for me, which delighted me like you would not believe. Go convince her to write more hot het, especially after last night's episode. It's nessa, Kat. It's very nessa!
Today is a Starbucks day, I think. Maybe I will indulge myself and get a chai latte on the way to work today. And in less than two weeks, I will be on my cruise in SUNLIGHT. I can do this.