Chapter Text
“Marissa Yamashida,” Detective Danny Williams starts, clapping his hands together, “and Damon Kane-Yamada.”
Yep. Just like I figured: separate us, and mention the other. I’ve seen enough SVU to know the kinds of tactics they’d pull on us when we got caught. ( If became a when, once I’d caught wind of the 5-0 Task Force.) “Well,” I reply, glancing around the dark interrogation room. They clearly spare no expense here, “Just me, for now.”
Commander Steve McGarrett crosses his arms, and somehow manages to look not the slightest bit more intimidating. He can’t be older than forty, and neither can his partner. Not much older than me and Damon, then. “Not worried about your boyfriend?”
“Ooh. Wrong on one account there, Captain.”
A muscle in his jaw twitches. “It’s-“
“Oh, I know.” I’d add a punch of jazz hands here, but alas, they’re handcuffed right now. “Commander. Wow.”
Detective Williams tries and fails to hide a smirk. Commander McGarrett glares daggers, then glances over at me. “Mind telling us what you were doing, sneaking into the HOLO CEOs private residence?”
I gesture down at my attire: a green skintight dress, paired with my panda dunks. “No sneaking involved, Commander.”
NINE HOURS AGO
You’d think after however many years of partnership, I’d get over seeing Damon in these sorts of situations. No such luck. He’s already standing in my living room, adjusting the collar of his gray dress shirt, then fixing the waist of his black slacks. “Thought we agreed to match.” I shrug.
“You suggested matching,” I remind, stepping over to him and putting the last touches of my lip gloss on. He stares for a moment too long, a thing I ignore. “I thought it’d give the wrong impression.”
“Oh, so we’re not going for the dating trope here?” Not argumentative, just curious. (Well, maybe a little of the former.)
I twist the cap of my makeup back on and glance at him in the mirror. Definitely not used to this. Will I ever be? “If you want to, we can.”
In the evening light streaming through the windows of my loft, I see Damon’s pupils dilate. “Run me through it,” he instructs.
“We were invited to HOLO’s first anniversary party,” I murmur, already stepping away to gather my things, HOLO being a brand new local e-sports company. They’re already rising up the national ranks, too. Pretty soon they’ll be going international.
Damon hums in acknowledgement, running his callused hands through his mess of black hair. “Too bad their CEO’s aiding and abetting their co-chairs illegal activities.”
“Which include, but aren’t limited to, sex trafficking and money laundering,” I explain.
“You get in, plant the hidden camera, and get out.”
“And if I get into a situation…”
“You let me know over comms.” Damon’s gaze flicks to me, then back to his reflection. “And I’ll be there.” His voice is far too calm for what I know he’s going to say next. “You were away for a month. Work trip. We couldn’t keep our hands off of each other.”
“Now do you see why I thought he was your boyfriend?” Ah, right. It was probably because Commander McGarrett was the one who’d thrown open the bedroom door to find the hem of my dress pushed up, Damon’s hands about to wander to a very very sensitive area.
The entire time I’ve been recounting last night’s events, my brain’s been working on figuring things out to keep myself distracted. Mostly, I’ve been thinking about how much 5-0 knows.
Damon and I are the affectionately labeled Omen and Thorn, an anonymous vigilante duo dedicated to stopping people like HOLO’s CEO, Brenton Sakawa. When we air out people’s dirty laundry on our socials, we wear masks which give us our namesakes, and disguise our voices.
If 5-0 knew who we were, this whole thing would’ve started very differently.
Good thing we got the camera recording before we got arrested. You know, just in case. “Uh, yeah. About that-“
The door to the interrogation room clicks open, and Commander McGarrett throws his hands into the air. Detective Williams groans. “What?” The former damn near shouts at the Asian man standing there.
“She’s good to go, guys.” He steps aside, and Damon smirks the smirk I’ve seen men and women alike fall for. Something in the pit of my stomach smolders to life, just as it had last night. “I think we just caught the Omen and the Thorn.”
Both men glance at each other, then between Damon and I. “Whoa, whoa, whoa,” Detective Williams mutters, hands flailing, “You mean to say those two kids who were running around, helping us narrow down these bastards?”
Oh. Well, that explains why that reveal didn’t just land me in prison.
The Asian guy shrugs, and I lift my wrists up. “Mind cutting me loose here?”
Detective Williams does the honors, and I flex my wrists, standing up. Damon waits until I’m in the hallway to speak. “Can we talk about maybe, uh, striking up a partnership here?”
Commander McGarrett stares at him like my best friend said something extremely stupid, which he kind of did. “Look, kid, you two have done a lot to help us with catching these characters,” he explains, using that specific tone I’ve familiarized myself with: condescension, “But we’re not really looking to, uh, partner with anyone-“
His phone buzzes, and he glances down at it, swears. “What, missed appointment?”
Detective Williams scoffs. “Yeah. He’s got a whole meeting with the governor.”
Damon nods. “Ah, right. That whole wanted fugitive thing.”
The Asian man barks out a laugh. Detective Williams literally grins. “Oh, I like these two already.”
Commander McGarrett rolls his eyes. “I’ve gotta go.”
Partnership or not, while the members of the 5-0 Task Force rush to the scene of the crime, we’re stuck at their headquarters. No doubt once we step into the public eye, all bets on our identities staying secret are off.
Lord knows this is going to be something Damon and I need to talk about. Especially since he’s been grumbling the entire time we’ve been searching through Jen Hassley’s social media. “What are you, a child?”
“Might as well be, considering the way they’re treating us!” Former CIA agent Jenna Kaye glances through the windows at us, and I offer a smile and a wave.
“Let me guess,” I breeze, tapping onto the next Google search page, “This wasn’t what you had in mind.”
Damon scoffs. “Of course it isn’t!”
Guess the talk will come sooner than later. I’m not complaining, though. “If we publicly join 5-0, there’s no way people won’t put two and two together,” he mutters, gaze not meeting mine. “Then we lose our edge.”
No more Omen and Thorn. Just Marissa and Damon.
Marissa and Damon, members of the 5-0 Task Force. Probably its two youngest members ever.
Members of the 5-0 Task Force who will have to answer for all the crimes we’ve committed in the name of justice. Not like Commander McGarrett broke into the literal governor’s house, then proceeded to break out of jail, though-
Speak of the devil, and he shall appear, along with a knock at the door. We make our way out of the spare office he’d given us and circle around the center console with the others. If Damon and I had something like this at our disposal…
Based on the way his gaze shimmers, I know my partner’s thinking the same thing. “What do you got?”
“HPD reports that all registered sex offenders within five miles of the abduction site have been accounted for.” Right. Because 5-0’s also got a FBI babysitter now, which I’m sure they’re loving. (We got wind of this from social media. Word gets around fast on this island.) “They’re expanding the search now.”
“And after a search through her social media profiles and personal information, nothing of notice came up,” Damon adds, holding out the tablet he’d borrowed. McGarrett takes it from him and slides the information onto the console. I nod.
“For a fifteen year old girl, she seems to be getting into an unusually small amount of trouble, at least online.”
“Alright, she’s got nothing personal on her blog, right?” Detective Williams reiterates, “It’s all generic publicity stuff. I mean, kids use these sites to vent, alright, share secrets, talk trash to each other.”
I shrug. “At least in the DMs, which we also searched.”
“Nada,” Damon confirms.
Agent Kaye frowns. “It’s like Jen doesn’t want anyone to know who she really is.”
Tell me about it.
“This… might be a stretch,” I start, “but Damon and I have access to certain, ah, information hotspots. I can head back to my apartment, grab my gear, start a real deep dive.”
“Absolutely not,” Detective Williams sputters.
“Go,” Commander McGarrett agrees.
Damon and I exchange a glance, and I have to fight back laughter. These two are worse than us, by far. “Aye aye, Captain.”
were the Omen and the Thorn, Damon and I were childhood friends through our parents. From the day I was born up until this very moment, at twenty-four and twenty-three respectively. I don’t know what I would do without him.
Shit. That sounded dramatic.
I guess I wouldn’t be able to get this information as fast as I could without him. There, better. Yawning, I step out of our office. Agent Kaye swipes something off of the main console. Damn. Playing games during work? (Actually, are Damon and I even getting compensated for this?)
“What you got for me, kid?” Commander McGarrett asks as I step into his office. It’s not any bigger or more luxurious than any of ours, a fact I appreciate.
“A name,” I explain, turning my laptop to face him, “Brant Cunningham. Once I dug into Jen’s private account, I found a bunch of correspondences between the two.”
“Nice work.” A beam of pride shoots through me, even as the next bits of info come to mind.
“Eh, debatable.”
Okay. Now we know that Jen’s adopted, even though that should’ve been established knowledge. And that the owner of the car she’d been kidnapped in belongs to the person whose house we’re currently breaking into: Matt Porter.
Damon stands, lock-pick in hand and opens the door. Lieutenant Kelly, Detective Williams, and Commander McGarrett all stare as if we’d done something monstrous. “What?” My partner asks. “Like you guys haven’t done this before.”
Detective Williams grunts in what I hope is acknowledgement, and leads the way in. Commander McGarrett turns to us, eyebrows raised. “You two, stay out here.”
I lift my hands, palms forward. “No need to tell me twice.” Only Damon carries a gun. I prefer my knife. Either way, though, I wouldn’t want either of us charging headlong into danger. A few painstakingly long minutes pass, with Damon keeping an eye on the back of the house while I watch the road. No quick getaway, and no sounds of a fight from within.
“We’re clear!” Commander McGarrett calls out, and we step into the house. Still, though, I drop my hand to the holster on my belt. Can never be too safe.
“No Porter, no Jen,” Lieutenant Kelly announces, “But you guys should see this.” Not a good sign, and even though I’ve grown accustomed to bad signs, there’s something about the gravity of it all that throws me off.
And it turns out my instinct was right, since plastered on the walls of this room are photos. This is worse than when Damon and I have a target: this is multiple victims. Including Jen.
Guess we’re in it now.