I do not own Hawaii Five-0 or any characters. No copyright infringement intended.
Notes: there may be some minor, bad language here and there. Steve whump/Danny whump eventually - definitely much angst. I need to thank a cast of characters too for getting this kick-started beginning with CinderH for the idea. Then Fifilla, Synbou, JazzieG ... and the many "is this stupid?" emails.
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Chapter 1
Danny was the antithesis of his usual self. Vocal had been replaced by a monotonous mono-syllabic tone that only resounded dully if he might be asked a question. Other than that, he wasn't speaking at all. His usual expressive demeanor was gone and while he seemed attentive, he was barely listening or paying attention to what was going on around him.
What remained was the whirlwind though because Danny Williams wasn't designed to ever be completely still. He was a silent whirlwind of ceaseless, nearly spastic movement. His blank face was lined with stressful, preoccupied thoughts and he hadn't left the hospital in eighteen hours, sixteen minutes and seconds that mounted at an excruciatingly slow counted pace.
His seventh round of the second floor brought him back to square one. Square one was where it all started ... and ended. There was truly nothing in between except a riot of white noise and a blurring sense of colors.
Danny palmed both eyes as he came to a stop at the foot of the plain hospital bed. When he stopped, his eyes were still closed and he blindly leaned forward knowing by a newly learned habit that the foot of the bed would be exactly where it was.
"You're a moron. A complete and utter moron, Steven." He'd seen his partner do it a thousand times. Well, perhaps not that many. Regardless, it had always shocked him, frightened him and left him feeling as if he himself, were the only mere mortal. Steve always came out on the other side .. mostly unscathed and always holding the bad guy by the scruff of his neck.
A broken window or an open sliding glass door and a leap into a great unknown after a fleeing perpetrator had become a kind of sick joke. It left Danny weak in the knees and with a jolt of fear that always morphed into anger about what could have happened. Except for this time when the fear morphed into an anger ... that fell back into a mind-numbing fear when Danny caught up and followed Steve's body ... down. Straight down to the ground.
"This time it happened, you ass. This time it really happened. Why don't you ever listen to me?" Danny ran his hands over his face and up into his hair. He dimly noted that he was shaking again and knew someone would notice eventually. Kono or Chin; if not them, than Doc Ramirez or is wife, Ellen.
He looked at his watch and counted eighteen hours, thirty-two minutes and a continual tick of second after second ... after second ...and thirty-two became thirty-three minutes.
Danny leaned on the edge of the bed frame and eventually found Steve's face under the tubes that ran into him for the ventilator. The tan on his face was gone. The healthy, vibrant complexion was gone. Steve looked as if he was almost gone and Danny felt that fresh flare of anger. Finally.
"It's not allowed. Not like this. Do it again and we talk about new partners. You're going to be the death of me." The twenty-something killer had died on impact; Steve was hanging on, but barely. The kid had fallen like a lead balloon onto the concrete sidewalk from the second story balcony after slamming through the glass sliders.
Steve had followed.
"Why do you always ... so damned ... stupid .. without thinking? What exactly did you think .. was going to happen?" Danny whispered brokenly as he remembered the familiar shock of Steve following through the broken glass. He remembered the sound first. The shrill of glass breaking and then the crunch of booted feet as they crushed the large splintered pieces into the rug. Then harsh sound amplified as two solid steps ground the shards into the tiny concrete landing.
His heart had been in his throat when he caught the final glimpse of his partner hurtling over the balcony's concrete ledge into blue sky. This time though, Danny's heart had yet to come down.
"You know what? There's not going to be an again. Ever." Danny whispered as the ventilator made its horrifying methodical rhythmic whoosh in and then out. He had expected to see his usual miracle: Steve grinning like a maniacal fool back up at him with wily perpetrator firmly in hand. It could be in a swimming pool, on another balcony .. hell, on the wings of an eagle. It had happened so many times before, Danny was left stunned by the final reality of what he saw. Luck had finally been worn out and the SEAL failed against gravity.
The twenty-something lay dead on the concrete sidewalk. Prone on his stomach with an acre of blood running from every orifice on his head and face. Almost mesmerized by the dead kid, it had taken Danny a few seconds to find his partner.
When he finally saw him, Danny couldn't find his voice and was running back downstairs and out through the lobby before he commanded his feet to move. Orders were shouted to Chin and Kono for back-up, crowd control and an ambulance.
In that one look, he had seen all that he needed to know.
Steve was four-feet off to the right. His lower body was partially suspended in a large bank of shrubs that were the focal point of a beautifully landscaped oval garden. He had missed the concrete sidewalk by four lousy feet and yet, had still landed very badly. The deep greenery of the bushes had broken his fall from the second story hotel room. Booted feet faced the sky and his upper body was oddly contorted towards the earth half-suspended in a free fall position. A flash of blue, black and red against light and dark greenery that baked hotly in the full afternoon sun. Steve's torso, shoulders and head faced downwards towards the grass of the perfectly manicured lawn. His arms and head lay in the dirt and he was woefully trapped. He'd been impaled by two sturdy branches and fairly crushed the rest into the ground but was still hanging as if in mid-air. The center of the now nearly crushed bushes would have an imprint of the man's body until the skilled landscapers could prune away the branches that would undoubtedly die.
When Danny reached him and fell to his knees between flowers and smashed greenery, he didn't know what to do for the oddity of the injuries and entrapment. He remembered to be vaguely amazed that Steve still had his gun in his hand and Danny automatically thumbed the safety on before prying it from his fingers.
"Steve?" He shook his head in disbelief as he lay his hand gently on the side of Steve's bloody and twig-scratched face. Danny could hear the sirens coming closer and he felt the crowd gathering behind him. But then Kono and Chin were there to push the gawkers back and away from both the suspect's body and the injured Five-0 officer.
One branch had pierced Steve's left thigh and blood oozed steadily towards his belt and was already soaking into his dark blue t-shirt. When Danny bent down to see Steve's face, he saw the second branch embedded into his side. It was strange to work on the upside down man, but Danny yanked his belt out and pulled it tightly around the wound in his thigh to slow the steady drip of blood. Then he didn't know what to do until more help arrived.
With half his body was suspended two-feet above the ground, Steve was stuck in the dense bushes and semi-conscious. He was breathing hard and beginning to struggle blindly as the blood rushed to his head. His forearms lay in the dirt as gloved fingers scrabbled for purchase and he tried to push up.
"Steve. Don't move. Help's on the way." Danny had grabbed the gloved hands that were flailing weakly as if still in free-fall. The shrubs had creaked, groaned, then cracked to settle more and Steve had gasped and then gurgled in response to another downwards shift. Larger branches sagged but wouldn't free him entirely and Danny didn't know what to do or how to help.
When Chin, Kono and the EMT's arrived it took all of their combined muscle along with the bolt cutters to cut their friend free from his strange cage. That was only after the EMT's had fastened a neck brace around their newest patient and instructed the workers on how to move him best to the waiting back-board.
"Did he hit his head?" Danny was frantic as Steve was moved to a gurney and the technicians got a better look at the injuries. He huffed out a stunned sound when each confirmed the streaky blood was coming from a myriad of scratches. He was lucky and he hadn't connected with the hard ground or anything in between.
Steve hadn't quite woken from the semi-conscious state though. In fact, he had stayed weakly combative and disagreeable from the time he'd been strapped to the back-board and moved into the rear of the ambulance. Then he had abruptly stilled as soon as Danny hauled himself in behind the last medical technician.
That had been now nineteen hours ago and Danny refused to leave the ICU at Tripler Army Medical Center. He blatantly flaunted his friendship with Doctor Alphonse Ramirez and if that appeared to be failing, his badge did the rest.
~ to be continued ~