Summary: After the events of Season 2 Episode 20 "Ha'alele," Danny is well and truly pissed off and decides there's no way in hell he's letting Steve do this to the team. Not again…not after what happened in North Korea.

Author's Note: I'm quite certain this is alternate universe (AU) since I highly doubt the show will scrap their rest-of-season scripts and episodes in favor of my story.

Warnings: Spoilers for Season 2 opener and Season 20 Episode 20. Also a warning for foul language, so turn back now if you have delicate ears. No slash, but your bromance meter might go a bit off-scale.

AFTERMATH

It wasn't entirely without precedent that Danny and Steve were sometimes on their own or paired up with someone else to do this, that or the other thing on a case.

Sometimes Steve and Chin paired up. Sometimes Danny and Kono. Sometimes Danny and Chin. Sometimes Steve and Kono.

And sometimes they went off following up leads on their own for a variety of reasons. Just because cops had partners didn't mean they were with that partner twenty-four/seven, even while on the clock.

Thing was, though, that in this particular case, there was only one reason Danny'd gone off to question a witness in Five-0's latest case that afternoon all by his lonesome and that was because Steve was gone. Not missing, exactly, because he at least had the decency to communicate via a 'Dear Danno' letter, and Danny assumed Steve knew exactly where he was even if no one else who cared about him did.

Once the Trashman was taken care of they immediately got handed another case, but it was one of those slow-going lots-of-research ones. Danny therefore finally had down time to process what Steve had done. It was down time he really wished he didn't have.

Having just spent two weeks camped out on Chin's and Malia's couch, Danny decided he'd overstayed his welcome and chose to squat at Casa McGarrett, if for no other reason than to make as big a mess as possible so that when Steve came back from wherever the fuck he'd gone this time, he'd have a reason to get pissed off with Danny for messing up his house like he did when Steve was on the U.S.S. Enterprise for a week.

Because Danny's logic was this: if a fight starts because Steve is pissed over the state of his house, then Danny can justifiably mouth off in response and circle it around to what the actual fuck Steve thinks he's doing going off half-cocked all alone to God-knows-where chasing after Joe Motherfucking White.

Did Steve ever stop to think that Wo Fat might just use the opportunity of Steve being away to come after his team? Did he? Huh?

Did he even remember that the last time he went off on some stupid mission having to do with Wo Fat that he'd had to be rescued by his team, a bunch of non-combat-trained Hawaii cops armed like they were Special Forces?

Did he even care that Danny Williams had willingly gone off to his own possible death, the possibility of leaving his daughter forever to save Steve's ass the last time he went to do something without his ohana to back him up?

Did he?

Did he?

Oh, Danny didn't just have a rant built up. He had a full four-hour lecture with no room for bathroom breaks and no Q&A session planned.

How self-centered and narcissistic can a bastard be? "The best the Navy has" certainly didn't do very well in North Korea, now, did he? No. He needed a Jersey cop, a rookie and his father's former HPD partner with a bunch of SEALs and his old instructor for backup on that little foray into what-the-fuckery.

Danny would've been perfectly fine dealing with this situation if it'd been Steve getting recalled to active duty for a SEAL job. Hell, he'd been expecting it for the past couple of years, fully expecting the U.S. Navy would need Steve for something since he was such a fucking golden boy in their eyes according to the former (now-dead completely untrustworthy bitch of a) governor.

He'd been prepared, once he'd seen the scrawl on the envelope, to find out that's exactly what'd happened. That Steve would get to play Cryptic Bastard by saying he couldn't tell any of them where he was going or how long he'd be gone or anything else because it was classified SEAL playtime. Danny would have gotten worried like any good war wife, thank you very much, but it would've been something he could deal with on the knowledge that Steve was being protected by a SEAL team, that he wasn't alone, that he was acting under clear orders with a clear mission, clear goal, clear boundaries and some sort of time frame.

But that's not what Danny now had to deal with. No. He had to deal with a man who either felt he couldn't trust his ohana with whatever had suddenly spurred him into taking off in the middle of the night, or who felt he was being a valiant and self-sacrificing martyr by sparing his team from whatever horrors he thought he might find in searching for Joe Motherfucking White.

God, how Danny hated that man. How he wished he'd never contacted him when Steve had been in jail for murder. How he hated himself for thinking the man would help Steve. He hadn't. He hadn't fucking helped Steve at all. All the man had done was drive Steve around the bend with regards to his father, his mother, Wo Fat, Noshimuri and goddamn Shell-fucking-burne.

Of course Steve couldn't let that shit go, and part of Danny was pretty goddamn sure White had known that when he'd supposedly revealed the identity of Shellburne at the cemetery over the elder McGarrett's grave. Joe knew Steve better than anyone in Steve's life, Danny was sure. So he had to have known Steve wouldn't let it go at that, especially once Joe up and left Hawaii right after.

Oh, how Danny hated Joe White. Fucking fuck.

Danny looked down at his hand in surprise, not really registering at first the fact that there was blood covering it. Blood, bits of glass and then oh, wow, it hurt, too.

Blinking, he looked up at the lanai door as the distant sound of thunder reached his ears. When lightning flashed he saw he'd gone and punched a hole right through the window in the door. Right through.

Blind rage.

Blind panic, more like.

Yet another thing to yell at Steve for if he ever came back.

When.

When he came back.

Danny opened the lanai door and walked out onto the beach. It was dark. Probably well after ten at night, he guessed. When the first drops of rain began to fall, he didn't move.

When the drops turned into a downpour, lightning flashing and deafening thunder surrounding him, he still didn't move.

Blood dripped off his fingers from the wounded hand that hung down at his side. It seeped into the sand, all traces removed by the driving rain.

Small whitecaps on the usually calm waters.

Hair plastered to his head, gel being rinsed away, soaking down into his shirt with the rain.

Every bit of fabric on his body clinging to every inch of his skin.

And the blood. Dripping. Disappearing.

If Steve didn't come back this time, there was no way of knowing where to go to find him. No way to rescue him. No one to call and try to pry Top Secret information out of as to his last known location.

No Joe White to call since he was the goddamn problem.

The SEAL team wouldn't know.

The governor didn't know.

And Steve wasn't answering his phone.

Danny's eyes widened.

Steve's phone.

His phone.

Danny turned and ran back into Steve's house. He beelined it to the kitchen table, leaving a trail of sloppy wet footprints in his wake. He could almost hear the water dripping from his hair, his soaked clothes as he grabbed his phone off the table, wet hands making it almost slip out of his grip to the floor.

Quickly he dialed Chin's number.

They could locate Steve with his phone.

Chin agreed to meet him at the palace.

Danny didn't dry off. He didn't change clothes. He did nothing but grab his keys and race out the front door.

He didn't even set the alarm.

He called Kono. She was on her way thirty seconds later.

They would find Steve. They would.

And they'd make sure once and for all that he knew he was never doing this to them again. Never going anything alone. Never. Again.

The cousins and Danny would see to it, and if worse came to worst, Danny would employ his secret weapon: Grace Williams.

Because even bad-ass motherfucking Navy SEALS couldn't resist those brown eyes.

In spite of his hurt hand…his wet underwear…his soggy shoes…his slowly drying and curling hair…the pouring-down rain that made it nearly impossible to see the hood of his Camaro…Danny smiled at the thought.

Fuck Steve if he thought Danny and Chin and Kono would just be okay with a stupid letter like the one he'd left. Fuck Steve if he thought they'd sit around with their thumbs up their asses while he played Where's Fucking Waldo like a one-man army.

Fuck Steve if he died before Danny had a chance to kill him himself for pulling this on them all.