Those first few words sear like a bullet. Or maybe bullets. Even if knows rationally, it's not far off of what he said to Danny. There are worse places than Vegas, to raise a kid. It's not stellar, but it wasn't other countries. Or war zones. Or places where children were never safe. But tilted this way, he hates the thought, even when it's not wrong either. Because no matter where Danny ended up, he'd be stellar.
The same cop he'd been before Grace was born, and through the whole time he'd known Steve. Plucked out of anything but anonymity, which is what happens when you box yourself off from everyone in the Force and the island by hating them, and slammed into Steve's way by the sheer, stupid, luck of the draw with who got the McGarrett case and who didn't. That Steve had liked his background.
Liked his choice of living in that squalid little all-window place he first found him, if it was for his kid. Before he even knew a good eighty percent of who Danny was and what he did was for Grace. He'd still be that guy, amazing father and the best cop that Steven had personally ever known, during all the time, not just the best of times. He'd still be that guy, if he wasn't with Five-0.
Or Steve.
It shouldn't feel like Five-0, too, might be dissolving in his hands, a handful of beach sand grabbed up in a fist, falling through his fingers, with no way to keep it all together, all in one piece. Unbroken, and untainted, and untampered with and uninjured. There was nothing about this job, being called in for the worst of the worst, ending up on those people's radars, that could make it that way.
Steve couldn't break it away, tossing it into driving but not a response. The draining feelings, that he was right, that she was right, that everything that happened this week was still his responsibility to have been there, and stopped, at least even caught onto before it had all come spinning down around their heads. Before the shock of his life, had wiped that nearly off the map, even.
Except he can't. All he can do is push the truck a little harder and watch the short distance to home evaporate before him.
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The same cop he'd been before Grace was born, and through the whole time he'd known Steve. Plucked out of anything but anonymity, which is what happens when you box yourself off from everyone in the Force and the island by hating them, and slammed into Steve's way by the sheer, stupid, luck of the draw with who got the McGarrett case and who didn't. That Steve had liked his background.
Liked his choice of living in that squalid little all-window place he first found him, if it was for his kid. Before he even knew a good eighty percent of who Danny was and what he did was for Grace. He'd still be that guy, amazing father and the best cop that Steven had personally ever known, during all the time, not just the best of times. He'd still be that guy, if he wasn't with Five-0.
Or Steve.
It shouldn't feel like Five-0, too, might be dissolving in his hands, a handful of beach sand grabbed up in a fist, falling through his fingers, with no way to keep it all together, all in one piece. Unbroken, and untainted, and untampered with and uninjured. There was nothing about this job, being called in for the worst of the worst, ending up on those people's radars, that could make it that way.
Steve couldn't break it away, tossing it into driving but not a response. The draining feelings, that he was right, that she was right, that everything that happened this week was still his responsibility to have been there, and stopped, at least even caught onto before it had all come spinning down around their heads. Before the shock of his life, had wiped that nearly off the map, even.
Except he can't. All he can do is push the truck a little harder and watch the short distance to home evaporate before him.