haole_cop | 00:00:00

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"Now it's my crime scene."

Those could have been, should have been, the last words he heard from McGarrett, and in a kinder world, they might have been, but the world hates Danny Williams, and he's not exactly feeling all that generous towards it, himself, so he's honestly not even a little surprised when the authoritative rap on his door comes attached to a too-tall, too-broad, too-aggressive Navy SEAL with revenge on the mind and Daddy issues from here back to the boardwalks of Wildwood.

He hates him.

Because of this joker, he's home in the middle of the day, instead of at work, work, he might point out, where he's attempting to catch the guy who did this to McGarrett, Sr., which is normally what the child of a murder victim wants, right? They want the cops to do their damn job and haul the dirtbag in for justice.

They don't storm in and take over like it's their goddamn platoon out in fucking Afghanistan.

Except McGarrett, okay, he doesn't seem to have gotten the memo. There's a reason officers don't get involved if the deceased was a family member, and this is exactly why: it makes people angry, irrational.

(He hopes to hell this is McGarrett being irrational.)

It's too close, too personal -- and it's also not his case anymore, so he's got no idea why McGarrett, shirt sticking to his skin from the soaking rain that just hit, because it rains every goddamn day here, what a fucking miracle, Hallelujah, is standing on his doorstep, because it isn't that.

(And it's not that either, he refuses, it's not happening, and there's no possible way this whackjob noticed. It could be he doesn't even have a timer, or got his blown off while single-handedly stopping an insurrection with a couple of grenades and a can-do attidtude.)

So he just stands and waits, with one hand still on the doorknob, ready to slam it shut just as soon as possible.

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"I don't like cotton candy," she says, firmly, which, okay, the kid has decent taste. No one likes cotton candy flavor, all right? It is an abomination.

But Steve's floundering in a way Danny hasn't seen at all today, and honestly can't, for a second, believe he is seeing, while treating this small child like she's an international threat, asking for state secrets instead of curious about whether or not they're cops, and, frankly, people are starting to pay attention. He's too brusque, too sharp with her, too obviously trying to get rid of her, and, apparently, is even worse at damage control than he is about not causing the damage to begin with.

Which means Danny's up to bat, but that's fine, okay? He may not be a SEAL or the leader of some highly trained death squad, but he can handle a little girl. "I got something you might like, okay?"

It's a world of difference between Steve's tone and his. Steve's all blunt, interrogating, and Danny is relaxed, friendly without being too friendly (because frankly, as a father, he can't think of anything that would make his blood run cold faster than two grown men showing too much interest in Grace), but it's a moot point. He's already handing his cone to Steve so he can reach through the passenger seat window and search until his fingers encounter soft plush and floppy ears. "How 'bout --"

The rabbit's huge and pink and floppy, and she lights up like it's Christmas morning when she sees it, which hurts a little, because he didn't get to see that smile on Grace's face, but it's triumphant, too, when she says, eager: "Yeah. Thanks!"

Taking it without further invitation, the stuffed animal almost as big as she is, and running off, and it's a good feeling, too. Even if it aches a little.

It's easy to make kids happy, but that doesn't make it any less incredible to see or satisfying to do. "You're welcome," he says, as she scampers off to play, leaving him to put his empty hands in his pockets, smiling to himself a little rueful, before turning back to Steve to get his cone back.

Only to find the other man already watching him, an unreadable expression on his face, that makes Danny squint in the sun, trying to interpret. "What?"

The snowcone gets shoved in his hand and he takes it, since it isn't a bomb or anything problematic, staring at Danny's back in confusion when the man is already digging into the car after saying he said something for the little girl who is, seriously, not moving away from the car. Which is where Steve wants her to be. Anywhere away from the car. Away from situations that probably won't happen here, but have happened in too many missions past that he doesn't think on.

Almost ever. The ones he never thinks about. Except when he wakes up swinging, having watched worlds burn again.

But Danny is digging in the car, and they are both waiting on him. Waiting on him to turn around with. What. There is a bunny. Pink and fuzzy and Steve's not sure if soft has a look. Forget his looking toward the excited kid next to him. He's busy marveling that thing is basically larger than half of Danny's body. Where was he hiding that in the back of the mustang?

She's excitedly hugging the thing around its neck and scampering off, lickety split, the feet of it dragging in the sand behind her as she's runs off, like Danny might change his mind. And Steve can't even begin to know where to start with what he wants to ask. Who even carries that around in their car? Just. What? And that it actually worked. That Danny Williams is over there beaming like a lune about that kid running away like he might steal it back any second. What.

Which is the same question that comes out of Danny's mouth while he's staring. Trying to find a single question.

But it's broken with the laughter coming from beyond Danny, as Chin suddenly pushes out from the crowd, returning to them from Komekona. From the money, and the ice, and the shirts, and a little girl, and truly giant pink bunny. And seriously, the only thing to hits Steve's head rolls right out his mouth, "You better have a name."

Because after all that, Steve deserves a name, the name. And an eta on when this shirt comes off.

They look so absurd it's impossible to keep from laughing, but the one that rolls out from his chest, easy and amused, isn't cruel. Why would it be? They look ridiculous, but they're still okay. He remembers little Steve McGarrett better than this stern-faced man, but that's okay, too. Everybody grows up. Some people get shoved into it faster and harder than others.

So he's not going to take it personally, but he's also not going to hide his amusement at their twin expressions of disgust at the situation. Kamekona, he might not want to deal with haoles, but he's got a sense of humor about it. "Yeah," he says, joining them, still smiling wide.

It's a pretty bad look. Makes them even more out of place than they were before. "Not here. You got a place I can access HPD's files?"

Chin Ho Kelly gets a pass. Call it faith, or familiarity. Ghosts on old graves. The return of that smile from this morning, that makes him look nothing like the man who snapping, made of rattler strikes and broken glass barely hanging on in one piece through super glue. It makes him look more real, too. More things Steve doesn't hate entirely.

Especially when it comes with him saying he has a name. Air and water vy for what is filling Steve head and lungs.

"We got a place," he nods, headed toward a trashcan to drop the untouched ices he's still holding.

Talking over his shoulder as he does it. Because he knows he hasn't even told Danny this much, because he wasn't sure he's need it even when Jameson and Fryer both mentioned it before he absconded with Danny. The details of the walls hadn't mattered to him, then. Just finding Danny, following up on Doran, which got them here in a twist of events.

"Second floor of The Palace, "All clacking like dominoes when he says it. " It's only a few hours old, but I can call and make-sure someone has a system up for us by the time we get there."

Even if the way he phrases it is nothing like it's going to be a request to whoever the poor person on the other end of the line ends up being. It won't be. Not if they have a name, and a name means they're going to need an intro, and Steve is not in the mood to slow down. Especially not for anyone handing out a line about IT builds.

If he has to, he'll find a way to requisition a different part of the building for it. He'll make it work.

"Got it," Chin nods, shifting back on his heels to head for his bike. "I'll meet you there."

Leaving Danny a little bemused, bewildered, not a hundred percent sure what that exchange was or what it meant. The only palace he knows is " -- Iolani Palace?"

The graceful building with that big gold statue in front, and the levels of modern office space? That Palace? There's already an office? When did that happen? He's watching Steve, dubious, wondering just what the hell it must be like to just say something, and make it true. "You're just picking things up left and right today, huh? Did you get us a dispatch desk, too? Are you hiding a newly-requisitioned training facility up your sleeve, somewhere?"

It's just -- it's so strange. A totally alien sensation, this whole possibility of actually getting people to do things, to work with him instead of fight him on every request. It hasn't been Danny's experience. Not at all. Not in years.

Danny looks. You know. Steve isn't sure. He doesn't have any clue what that is on Danny's face.

This pinched sort of confusion, that he's not sure what has to do with anything. But rather than make any sense of that questions just start firing out of Danny's mouth like bullets from an automatic rifle. Bang. Bang. Bang. Not waiting in the slightest for Steve to answer any of those questions, while he's just firing off more of them with those suspicious blue eyes and the hands that seem to be on a contact control with his mouth as well.

Makes it easier for Steve to just narrow his eyes a little at all of it, and jerk a thumb toward his door. "You getting in the car, or you just going to stand out here getting sunstroke?"

All that pale skin could not bode well for anyone. Tourist or hawaii hating new resident. Of course, he had a place. A place he hadn't wanted or cared about. But a place. What was Danny expecting? That they were going to work out of the shoebox of his car? Steve reached down to pull off the Shave Ice shirt with one hand as his other was reaching for the car door.

The shave ice gets tossed, and he's tugging his own shirt up and over his head as he heads back around the end of the car to the driver's side, rolling his eyes, because, fine. A non-answer is exactly the one he was looking for, right? It's not like this is the kind of information that would be good to share with your partner, no matter how newly requisitioned they are, no matter how poorly you get alone, like gasoline and lit matches.

But there's nothing to do, aside from getting back in the car and starting it up, casting a last glance across the beach, like he might actually see someone he knows, that's not quite searching for a little girl holding a pink stuffed rabbit as big as she is, before he's got a hand on the back of the passenger seat, and is looking over his shoulder to back out.

"Okay, well, they got about fifteen, twenty minutes to get something set up. Good thing you've got the Governor on speed-dial."

He's starting to think Steve could get it done on his own, actually, without bothering with things like proper channels and paperwork.

At least he follows direction well, Steve's thinking. Slipped into the seat, shirt tossed into the back.

When he's raising his eyebrows at Danny even while he's already looking for Jameson's number. He doesn't have many numbers. Hasn't acquired any for HPD. Or Danny or Chin for that matter, which he should rectify shortly, especially now that they are his team, and he might need them muster ready at anytime of days or night while on this case for Hesse. It's not like international terrorists care about anyone's sleep cycle.

If he had other numbers to call, he might call them. But the honest truth is, it's easier to annoy the top of the chain. Especially when she hasn't pushed back yet. She asked for him, and he said no. Vehemently, in the face of her begging and bribing. And then, he called and said yes. Took the case, took the officer, took someone else. She's already got one body count. And she knows he'll need more, that he could ask for everything. Keeps playing that face when she said Your rules, my backing, no red tap.

He's going to make her live by putting that on the table.

Which is exactly what he's doing when he's not giving Danny anything more than that look, while he's putting the phone next to his ear. When instead of answering questions that will soon be entirely obvious answers to the man in the driver's seat he's hearing Hello, Commander.

"We've got a lead," really didn't need any lead up. He's still nowhere near pleased he had a reason to get in bed with a politician. Especially one desperate enough to use his family against him, and to lay out promises of unending power. If something was too good, as the saying went. "I'm going to need a quick facelift on my HQ. We need access to HPD files ASAP."

The was a second of silence. "Fifteen minutes. Twenty, tops." Another, nodding to the phone and the window, as the scenery was starting to fly by. "Yes, Governor. I'll keep you updated if there any problems."

Which meant little more than that he'd send his problems to her if he had problems, even though he hadn't checked once with her to give an update on the people he hired, the choices he made, the body on the ground, the CI that had been paid. He was going liberal with his lack of red tape, and she could bring it up later if she had a problem with that. For now he had a name with Chin, and her word she'd get people on it right now, and that was all he needed as he hung up.

Edited 2014-01-27 00:37 (UTC)

He wonders how immeasurably deep the hole he'd be tossed into if he tried speaking that abruptly to a superior would be, and how long he would be left there to rot, because he doesn't exactly mince his words with his Captain, and look where that's gotten him. Even if the guy hated him already, for absolutely no good reason at all, aside from his mistrust of haoles.

But that's just another difference between them, right? Steve gets the same treatment, but he still gets results, runs roughshod over the bigotry that Danny's drowning in, like sinking in the slow pull of mud. People might side-eye him, or toss out that word, haole, like they're sticking a tag on his forehead, but they do what he says, anyway.

Danny's been out here with a megaphone and billboard for six months, and he couldn't say he's gotten even one single person to listen to a damn thing he's said or wanted since he started. "Is that satisfying?"

It's curious. He's curious, lifts one hand off the wheel to let it turn in the air, a shrug of a gesture. "Me, I would find that satisfying."

Ordering around a high-ranking government official, with no fear of repercussion, but then, maybe Steve is just fearless. SEALs are supposed to be, right? And it's not like the guy has so much as batted an eye at anything they've seen or done today, not even when he was hanging around the scene of his own father's murder. Danny guesses little things like asking for equipment, or going through the proper channels don't even ping his radar.

He's hitting the call off, while Danny is talking. Already. It's like a superpower. Or a compulsion.

Making him look up, with a crinkle to his brow, like maybe he doesn't get the reference. Or maybe he's missing something from the way he's asking about it. Some odd, nearly quiet, envy that Steve can't really place or make sense of. Especially when everything about Jameson hamstrings his annoyance. Steve hadn't yet seen anyone in all of this as more than a means to the ends of Hesse. Jameson had only been the first one that docket.

And it is. Even if his face doesn't give a twitch of that away. It is satisfying. Taking her for it.

Even if he knows it's a dangerous game of figuring out how much he can push before he meets the wall.

But he's not acknowledging that part of the comment. He's not acknowledging it feels good at least in a tiny drop. To have the resources at his beck and call, continually getting him what he needs or wants. Because it's everything is running in a straight line toward Hesse. To hear that pausing, curious, near envious tone coming from his left. Even if he just continued to give Danny a look like he's insane, or indecipherable. Rolls straight over that into the more important things.

"They're still working on wiring, and furniture, but we'll have a working computer and access to the database by the time we get there."

"You're a really stellar conversationalist, you know that?"

With a disbelieving glance tossed across the cab towards the passenger seat and the man sitting in it, while Danny's eyebrows climb up and in towards each other. Two things, Steve's said today, that haven't been directly related to the case. First his curiosity about Danno (and he can just keep being curious, okay, that's no one's business, and definitely not Steve's), and then actually answering a question about how he knew Chin.

And that's it. Does he even know how to have a conversation that isn't about a mission, or strategy, or collecting and following leads?

He rolls his wrist just enough to see the edge of the line of numbers stamped across the thin, pale skin inside it, frowns back at the road. It just doesn't make sense, okay? Steve is nothing like Rachel, and he's nothing like the girls Danny's been interested before, or the guys he's every now and again checked out (listen, you never know who the numbers will end up on, better to be prepared if at all possible so you're not dealing with a sudden about face of everything previously known about your own preferences). He's like no one Danny's ever met before: focused and steely, reckless, almost entirely silent after the first flurry of words in the garage.

Yeah, he doesn't get it. "Okay, well, anything else you want to pick up on the way? Equipment? Coffee? Food? Have you actually eaten today, or are you just running on righteous fury? Because I feel like that's got pretty much zip for nutritional value."

It's questionable whether any reaction really touches his face at the first outburst from Danny. A return to that commentary in the form of insults that does cause Steve to at least keep looking in that direction. Because he totally just gave him information. About what he was asking about before Steve made the call.

But Danny decides to leave his megaphone peanut gallery heckling for even more questions, which just leaves Steve staring at him wondering what the hell. Just seriously what the hell. Danny is railing about him not talking, but just watching Danny talk is like watching a human puzzle box exist at him. Every new breath has another slew of words in a different hue of emotion from the one before it. And. It. Just. Never. Stops.

He never shuts up. He's never at a loss for words. He never needs to take a breather.

Which, of course, has nothing to do with Steve's inability to answer the question in the middle there. He was everything on himself he needs until he needs another few mags of bullets. He doesn't even want the equipment he has. They're more details to a promise made that has a terminally short end date with Hesse. Right? But food. When was the last time he ate? When was the last time he felt hungry?

He doesn't want to think about why he knows he didn't eat earlier. He really doesn't want to detour and pause the case for it now. Even and close to shoulder still for his thoughts at least gets -- "Coffee might not be a bad idea."

It isn't. It's the shortwire, but he's run on less. He knows he'll be fine. He's still got days in himself. But he's got them, too.

"We have no idea how long we'll all be looking at files once Chin gives us the information on this guy."

"Okay, we'll get food."

That's not precisely what Steve said, but, for one, Danny is starving, being shot really jumpstarts a guy's appetite, and for two, that hesitation is pure robotic bullshit. It's heading well into the afternoon, and Danny seriously doubts that Steve bothered to stop and get something after running around the island stealing crime scenes from hardworking cops such as himself, because the guy had to actually stop and think about it. "Anything to get that shave ice flavor out of my mouth. If I've gotta have flavored ice, okay, first of all, it better be cherry," lifting his thumb from his finger, followed by his index finger -- one, two, "-- and it better be from Rita's. Anything else?"

All the fingers flatten out, and he sweeps his hand out, like he might possibly erase the menu of thirty-odd flavors and flavor combinations Kamekona had been accosting the beachgoers with. "Overkill. Just not natural. I will make an exception for lemon, but either way, okay, that was not food, so we are getting food, I'm starving, and I bet even SEALs need to eat sometime, or have they just started genetically modifying you all into actual robots, now?"

None of it particularly matters, he's just pouring words out into the air because he's got nothing better to do, while steadfastly ignoring the flash of red that blinks at him now and again as his hand waves.

It won't kill them to stop for a second. The office is still getting set up, and it wouldn't hurt to offer Chin something to eat, too, bridge a little of that gap.

Besides. He caught the way Steve hesitated, thought about it, waved it off again, and there's just no need for that here, today. It's not the middle of the freaking Serbian desert, all right, they can pause to grab a tuna sandwich, or something.

That wasn't what he said, but Danny does seem to give a rat's ass.

Goes on for nearly half a minute about shave ice and some place Steve hasn't a clue where is. It doesn't sound familiar, but then a lot of things neither look and read familiar, even when they feel it. For all he knows it could be some new place downtown that man only likes because it's his daughters favorite. Though maybe he doesn't have the worst taste. Steve likes those two. He likes tropical flavors, too. Or he did as a kid. Like them in drinks, especially once he was too gone to care.

But, of course, he comes round to his point. Round like he needed to circle Diamond Head before he could get back to why he decided that what Steve said about coffee totally somewhere equalled getting food in Danny's head. Which was that Danny wanted food. But couldn't say that, had to ask, like Steve somehow would have known. And Steve, and all SEALs, must be broken because he wasn't dying of hunger yet. Making Steve furrow his eyebrows, but toss out with something like annoyed perversion.

Because it still smarts as an annoyance that the man is insulting Navy SEALs, like their training was ever a problem.

"It's classified." Pretty much like every single thing he ever really did, said, was. He was a ghost with a gun.

"I could tell you, but--" This a head tip toward the window. Everyone knew how that one went.

And he'd hate to deprive another little girl of her dad in just shortly under two weeks.

"Really?"

It's heavily slanted towards disbelief and exasperation, just like the furrows digging themselves between Danny's brows as he glances over. "You're actually going to pull that card? Is that what passes for humor among you strong and silent types? Or, no, wait, I bet that's classified, too. Why did the chicken cross the road? I don't know, that information doesn't pertain to this mission and has been redacted."

He's just a barrel of laughs, this guy, with his monosyllabic answers, or lack of vocalization at all, and Danny's shaking his head even as he's signaling his turn.

(Not that he's all that interested. SEAL training seems about as appealing as getting a pillowcase full of nails slammed into his temple.)

There's another glance over. "Any place you haven't been in a while you might want to grab something from?" And, okay, he's leading. He is. If this were his first trip back to his hometown, he'd want to hit all his favorite spots: grab a corned beef special and cup of coffee from J's diner down the street, maybe a slice from that one dingy pizza place on the corner, and you never know. Lieutenant Commander Steve McGarrett might have missed a place or two while he was gone.

The guy has to be at least part human, right?

Anyplace he hasn't been in while...

Yeah. Everywhere. All eight islands.

Sure, there are a handful of places he knows won't have closed, but only because they were old before he even knew they existed, or existed to know they existed. Ones he doesn't want to know if have folded under in the past. And some here and there, mom and pop's hiding in holes, coming and going with the wind and the waves, like their owners and customers. All of those are there for the first time when he hits land and gone the next time with half decades or more between.

"Wherever's good." He just gives a tight, clipped shake of his head, like he can't really even shake it fully to either direction.

"An L&L, maybe." It was cheap, easy, and greasy. Local enough, and it's not like he cares enough to feel anything about faster food. Other than it is will be fast, and that's helpful for getting on to The Palace sooner rather than later.

"They've got plates to go." If he's going to insist on this nonsense and keep asking questions, like somehow Steve should want to wander down Hawaii's memory lane. "And whatever we get for Chin will probably work."

He wouldn't mind wandering Hawaii. Taking in a sight or two he remembers too well, gorgeous and more technicolor than technicolor, never fading with time, and never being less bright when he's here. Maybe even those places in those persistent dreams now and again that don't leave him alone. But there's nothing down memory lane for him here. A house covered in dust and blood and ghosts of people no one saw enough, half an island and half a breath away, that underneath it isn't covered in anything but more dust and blood and ghosts no one ever acknowledged either.

"Look at that, he makes a decision. L&L it is; I think there's one on the way."

Truthfully, he still can't quite adjust to the Hawaiian version of fast food. Instead of hoagies from a truck, or gyro, or anything else you could easily eat while walking, they're all about caloric mounds called plate lunches: white rice and charbroiled meats swimming in barbecue sauce or gravy, sometimes with an egg thrown on top, usually with something fried. How the hell Honolulu isn't the most obese city in America he's got no clue; everyone seems to be able to put them away without too much difficulty, whereas Danny feels like he's actively swallowing cement, like he might sink in water after one of them, if he were so foolish as to try and swim.

Which is not to say he isn't routinely foolish, okay, because he is, and this is all just another example of it, because he just can't leave well enough alone, can he? No matter who those numbers had stopped on, he would've found himself involved somehow, because he just can't stop himself, has, apparently, not yet had enough of the world blowing down his house of cards, stomping all over his pathetic sandcastles. No, he just keeps building them, then waits for someone to come along and burn them to the ground, hands them the matches and gasoline to do it.

Whatever. He's not doing this for some damn numbers on his wrist, he's doing it because it's his job, and he's good at his job, and because no one should have to hear their father die over the phone and then be forced to hunt down his murderer alone.

Steve watched the scenery blow by, still more stuck on those words than he wanted to be. More annoying than gnats circulating near his ears and dragging his focus away, they just kept returning. Or maybe it was, they just kept not leaving.

While he made light of it. Like Steve had named anything other than a place one could pass two or three of between the airport and wherever you were ending up. Maybe he's exaggerating, maybe Danny even means well, but it grates down against his skin, and those words, and the words they are dragging up. His Dad's voice, and all those words, he keeps replaying and rearranging, like somehow, if he scrambled them, and then made a cypher out of them, that last conversation would make more sense.

Steve just gave him a look, like it wasn't all coalescing as a bruise he kept punching purposefully, "You talk a lot."

Steve let it crinkle up his face, making it hard to tell if that was bland amusement or blank insult, or somehow combination of both wrapped up in the conundrum of watching Danny, and reporting back to him on all the things he sighted, from the roll of his head against the head rest. "You know that, right?"

It needed to go down in the book. Talks nonstop chatter like the silence had to be kept back with a swinging bat. Right under the line about being sensitive about everything under the sun. Was probably going to take this as the next right to do that, again. Which maybe that should have been a reason for Steve to keep his own mouth shut. But, hell, why would he start now. Danny was the one keeping them from just getting straight on with the job as it was.

"You know, I'm sure you'll be amazed to hear this, what with your stunning powers of deduction and all -- seriously, it's practically Holmesian, I should turn in my badge in disgrace -- but you are not the first person to say that to me. You're not even the first person to say that to me this week, although I admit you've dashed across that finish line first today. Of course I know that. Anything else would be unforgivably self-ignorant and I've already got enough problems."

It doesn't quite sting, though it's not exactly his favorite thing to hear, right? And especially not in that dry, bland tone, like Steve doesn't really care, but he's just pointing it out because he feels like he should. Danny knows. He knows he's loud. He knows he talks a lot, too much, all the time. Knows he's always saying and doing the wrong thing, all right? He was married. He knows. Like he knows he's short, comparatively speaking, and wears ties despite everyone on this miserable excuse for a landmass hating them.

Fine, they all hate him, too, he's okay with it. "Any more thrilling observations you planning to make today? I'm just curious." Hand leaving the wheel to wave in a loose circle in the air. "I mean, hey, you got me all figured out in thirty seconds, right?"

Steve's not surprised, he isn't. That the guy goes off. Loud, and sensitive, about this.

But, maybe, at the same time, there's something in the way Steve's eyes stay focused on him while Danny is driving the car, waving a hand, like it's helping him enunciate his points, and says more at this point after Steve had made his. Just keeps going on, talking about talking, for the love of God. The words just keep rolling out, and the extra information Steve never asked for, but Danny slathers on, history and opinions, in on, decking them out.

He's all pink and soft when you hit him with any direct comment. But any time Steve tries to box him, he remembers the shock and surprise. The red, the jar of his teeth. Shifts his teeth just barely, just the very few millimeters it takes to be able to feel that soreness on his face where Danny decked him. Trying to line those into one person and one score of sensible lined reactions. This with the hand waving and thin skin, and that with the knuckles connecting with his cheekbone.

But he isn't going to say anything about any of that at all. He doesn't have it put together yet. Disparate pieces.

Steve just crinkled his brow, before raising one eye, laying on thick with only singularly, "Holmesian? Really?"

"You got something against classic literature?"

Droll and dry, said over his shoulder, with his eyebrows cocking like he might actually be spoiling for a fight if Steve says he doesn't enjoy the works of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, as if he cares what Steve reads, or if Steve reads, as if he ever has time to even glance at a book these days.

Well, okay, he does. Have time. He's got spades of time, tons of time, more time than he knows what to do with, which is why he normally takes weekend shifts on the weeks he doesn't have Gracie, just stays at the office, going through papers or filing reports. There's plenty to do, if he puts his mind to it, and it's only kind of the mind-numbing boredom that would have made him want to jump off a cliff before a year was up.

But that's all neither here nor there, right, what he chooses to do with his free time, even if it's to make it anything other than free. The point is, he's not sure he likes Steve's attitude. At all.

But how is that anything new?

The center of Steve's brows pinch oddly, nearly matching a smug tug at the edge of his mouth.
Eyebrows raising at the center, because, seriously, there's no way Danny is a book-beater.

He's seen that 'house.' It's not like there were piles of books hiding anywhere.

Not that Steve doesn have a problem with books. Even ones he hasn't read or considered, with good reason, especially since being sent away from Hawaii. Not that he'd ever been interested in Doyle much growing up, but he'd been even less interested in most of the things his father had an interest in pretty shortly thereafter. And most things Sherlock Holmes related, aside from the odd one-off sideways joke, landed squarely in that box.

Which Danny just happened to trod on, unrelated, like his leg was in front of the mustang to roll over. The oddest memories coming from nowhere. Dusty and unused, as impotent today as they were unimportant the two decades of time spent not looking at them. But it was worth it to see Danny take it a little personally. From his comment on four million words, to his focus on just one of them, and not a single other.

He takes quick little glances over, hitting the blinker and taking a turn at the next intersection. Steve McGarrett, mystery. Suddenly brought to life out of the pages of bare text and the single photograph in Danny's file that looks like basically every other military personnel headshot he's ever seen: American flag, white cap, neat uniform, deadpan expression that's nothing like the faint -- is that amusement?

He almost wants to squint, and look closer, would, if doing exactly that wouldn't mean he'd probably ram his Mustang straight into a fire hydrant or telephone pole.

It couldn't be. This guy doesn't have a sense of humor, right? It must be one of those things they stopped handing out at boot camp.

But it does kind of look like it. Amusement. Or something like it, perched there in the furrow between his eyebrows, and the way one corner of his mouth is looking a little softer, like the shadow of a smile that's existing in some other universe, on some other Steve McGarrett's face.

Whaddya know.

He sneaks one more quick, exasperated glance. "Anyone ever tell you people normally use words to communicate, not just steely glares and judo moves?"

"Pretty sure that's just what the people without them say."

Sure. Okay. He could say nothing, or he could let a few words roll off his shoulder.

Not that he was saying, as Danny just naively put it, 'steely glares and judo moves' hasn't gotten him several things, several times, but it's not like he's needed to rely on that with a guy sitting next to him in a long time either. It's odd, he can admit that, being somewhere his rank and skills mattered enough to be the fire behind the movement of this whole day, but also nearly non-existent where it came to individual people. Like the man sitting next to him. Talking to him about talking.

Both like he doesn't know how to, and like it was anything even remotely important in what Steve consider necessary communication, or necessary interactions, in a normal day. Not that today was normal in any part. Not that anything has felt it since Anton mentioned not talking to his dad enough, but even if that snowball hasn't stopped he's maybe still looking at Danny like this is almost entertaining. Like he's debating whether it is, or Danny having opinions is.

Since he seems to have one, and feelings on it, on every single thing that crosses his path.

Just to punch it in, he adds with a nod out the front, "Don't miss the turn in."

"You know, there's nothing wrong with my eyes."

As in, he can see the upcoming turn just fine, thanks, doesn't need some Navy SEAL sniper-vision to see a giant fast food sign on the side of the road, just like he's never needed jiu-jitsu or whatever the hell it was Steve pulled on him back at Doran's, okay, he's always been fine fighting quick and dirty, whenever it's come up. And steely-eyed looks are a dime a dozen.

He might not give a damn if people like him, but at least he reacts to them like a human.

One flick of the blinker and lane change, and he's making that turn Steve was so thoughtful as to remind him of and pulling into a parking spot before putting the car in park and switching the engine off. "Anything else you'd like to help me improve on, or are you done?"

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