grenadesandohana | Green Island, Hawai'i, Saturday afternoon

Green Island, Hawai'i, Saturday afternoon

The call from their meth dealing mark came in on Saturday, so Steve and Danny didn't have to fly with all of their baggage crashing around them.

They'd taken a portal back to Honolulu and then the Cessna they'd commandeered over to Turtle Island to meet Dae Won, who'd then packed the cargo area full of meth.

Steve reminded himself not to kill this guy immediately because they needed his contact on O'ahu, too.

He'd slid into the pilot seat, put on his sunglasses, and taken himself, Danny, and Dae Won into the sky, heading back for O'ahu.

The small talk was excruciating for the first part of their hour-long flight, even with their covers as people who didn't care about drug shipments, and Steve was almost excited to see another aircraft coming up behind them. Maybe it'd be the Coast Guard. He didn't care who got the credit for the bust, as long as the drugs stopped coming in.

"You expecting company?" he asked Dae Won idly.

[OOC: Warning for incoming character injury. Taken from episode 6.25]

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"Gauges, gauges... Airspeed 155, altitude 500 but it's falling, and fuel... no go. Fuel's on zero."

That wasn't going to make landing this damn thing any easier, was it?

It would make it a lot faster?

"All right, you're running out of fuel," came that calm voice. "We need to get you down as soon as possible. The Coast Guard and your task force have been notified, so we're going to take you through the emergency ditch procedure, all right?"

"What do you mean by 'ditch'?" Danny asked, risking a glance over at Steve.

There was a slight pause. "Detective, based on your current altitude, airspeed and available fuel, you're never gonna make the runway."

"What are we going to do?" Dae Won asked, panicky.

The plane shuddered again and the vibration of the engines suddenly stopped. "Control, we just lost both our engines here."

The guy in air traffic control was not being paid enough. The voice came through, calm and clear. "All right, Detective, beneath the dash is a large red handle. Pull it to feather your prop. Don't try to fight gravity. After that, next to the radio controls, are your landing gear settings. There's a switch labeled "up water." Flip it."

In his chair, Steve was still and terribly pale.

"Uh-huh, large red handle..." He muttered as he did as instructed. "Do not fight gravity, flip switch, copy. Now what?"

"Now you're gonna have to put her down on the water. Adjust your course to 175 degrees, and let yourself glide," came the reply.

"Ah--" Danny was almost about to do it, but of course he stopped and looked at Steve. "Ah, no. Control, that's not gonna work, okay? My partner, he's... he's unconscious. If I put this thing down on the water, I'm not gonna be able to get him out of the plane and he's gonna drown."

Which was a thoroughly unacceptable outcome.

"You don't have a choice, Detective," came that same calm voice, sounding sympathetic now.

Oh, wrong person to tell that to there.

"I do have a choice," Danny said, trying not to sound as shaky as he did. "I'm gonna put it on the beach."

"Detective, we strongly advise against that," the air traffic controller replied. "I understand your concern for your friend, but consider yourself. Your best chance of survival is a water landing."

Dae Won, having abandoned his attempt to figure out if Steve was alive, was staring at Danny like he was crazy.

He was going a little crazy, yes

"Get that beach cleared, you hear me?"

Danny followed the instructions for that water landing, aiming for the beach instead. It'd be fine. Right? But just in case...

"Hey, Steve, listen to me. I know you've never been any good at listening to me, but right now, you got no choice, you stubborn son of a bitch. Do not die. Hey! Listen to me, do not die, okay? I'm not landing this thing for you to die on me! You understand?"

There was a brief pause before air traffic control came back with, "Your team is clearing the beach. You should hear the tsunami alarm as you approach. Good luck, Detective."

Below them, from Waikiki to Kuhio Beach, the tourists were fleeing like a kicked anthill.

"Hold onto something," he ordered Dae Won, reaching over to keep Steve steady as the plane shook a concerning amount.

He really never needed 'crash a plane' on his list of achievements, but here he was, impacting the beach and skidding across the pristine sands before finally coming to a stop.

As soon as the sand from the crash had settled back onto the ground, Kono, Chin and Grover were scrambling to the plane. Chin yanked the door on the pilot's side off. "Steve, Steve--"

He glanced at Danny. "He's still alive," he said, trying to reassure everyone listening.

"Ambulance," Danny said, struggling to help them get him free from the wreckage. "And him--" he pointed at Dae Won. "Custody."

Dae Won froze halfway out the back as all of the tainted fentanyl tumbled out of the storage section of the plane. Chin shot him a "I am So Disappointed You Even Tried That" glare and slapped him into cuffs as Grover took his place yanking Steve out of the car.

"EMTs, over here!" Grover bellowed. "Multiple gunshots. Move move move!"

Edited 2025-06-02 15:24 (UTC)

"Code three to Tripler," one of the EMTs called, already moving in to assess and stabilize Steve as best they could after, you know, all that.

"Sir, we need to check you too," another EMT said to Danny.

"No... I'm fine." He was riding a serious adrenaline high and couldn't feel anything other than panic over Steve still. "Just broken ribs."

Uh huh.

Kono took one look at Danny's face and decided that she'd go book the drug smuggler with Chin. "We'll meet you at Tripler," she said to Danny and Grover, then mouthed "make him get checked out" over Danny's head. Grover nodded. "I'll follow you," he said to Danny. "Get in the ambulance."

Rude to use his height against him, Kono!

Danny tore his eyes away from Steve like he was just sort of registering that Grover was there. "I gotta find out who did this," he said like that made a lick of sense after crashing a plane.

"You are going to Tripler and letting your team do that part," Grover said. "Chin and Kono will make the perp tell them everything. You need to stay with Steve."

"Yeah." Danny let out a shaky breath and nodded. "Yeah. I'm gonna--" Struggle into the ambulance. Because those 'broken ribs' were finally catching up.

"We're right behind you, brother," Grover said, clapping Danny gently on the shoulder. "Get going."

The drive to Tripler was both the longest and shorted of Danny's entire life. But once they got to the hospital, they were immediately separated for Danny to get checked out and Steve put into immediate surgery.

And Danny's phone was dead. Hopefully Grover could call Rachel and the kids for him...

Green Island, Hawai'i, Saturday afternoon

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