Disclaimer: I do not own the characters of this work of fiction, and no profit, monetary or otherwise, is being made through the writing of this.
A/N: Written in response to a comment made by Lidil (at A03) on the story, "Scattered Thoughts Like Buttons," a quick write. Please forgive errors.
Danny is Chin's lifeline, and it's never more apparent than at this moment, when he's staring into eyes so blue that they eclipse the sky, trying to make sense of something that doesn't make sense. It's not for lack of trying on his part. Not for lack of searching Danny's deep blues for a sign of something. A sign of understanding.
There is none.
It doesn't make sense.
Chin's mind is stuck on repeat, his eyes trapped within Danny's, and he knows that there's a reason for it. A reason that he cannot look away.
"Don't," Danny says, voice softer than the melting dawn. "Don't look. Keep your eyes on me."
It's an order. The words are faint, and strained. Danny's voice is cracking, and his eyes are watering, and Chin can feel Danny's hands on his face - palms full of callouses earned through hard work; skin sandpaper rough. His hold is firm, yet gentle. Calming.
"Don't look," Danny repeats, and Chin doesn't think he wants to look anywhere other than where he's looking now. Danny's eyes are an ocean, storm tossed, and yet crystal clear and strong as the man's hands on Chin's face. They anchor him. Keep him safe from whatever hell it is that he's stepped in now.
"It's going to be okay," Danny insists. "It's going to be okay. Just...keep still, okay? And don't look away. Keep your eyes on me."
Chin wants to answer Danny. Thinks he is, but even though his lips move to form the words, there is no sound, and for a moment that bleeds into too many seconds for Chin to keep track of, everything - the blue of Danny's eyes - fades to white and black; a sickly grey.
And then he's breathing; pulling in gasping lungfuls of air, and Chin wonders when he drowned, and how long it's been since he's last breathed. It hurts. His lungs feel like balloons on the verge of popping.
Danny's eyes swim in and out of focus, and Chin knows that the man is talking to him, he can feel the ghosting of breath across his cheeks, his lips, his overheated skin. Can feel the familiar rumble of Danny's voice within his chest, and that's when he realizes - too little too late; at just the right time - that Danny's pressed up against him, muscles taut, body a quivering arrow, and has been all along.
He can feel the trembling, can sense the mounting panic in his lover's every breath; the words that he cannot hear, but can feel. And Chin knows that it's some kind of mantra; Danny begging Chin to stay with him, and to keep his eyes on Danny's.
It's not a hardship, Chin thinks,to look into your eyes.
They're a shimmering blue, like the ocean when the sun's hitting it just right, creating a heat mirage that dances across the waves. And Chin isn't stupid. He knows that Danny's eyes are filled with hot, salty tears, and that, if he were to look away, to seek out the source of the pain that he's now aware of, a pain that Danny, and maybe Steve and Kono, had been keeping at bay until just now, those tears will fall, and they'll burn a track down Chin's face, and along his neck, and they'll pool there, in the crook, trapped between his collarbone and shoulder.
Danny is Chin's lifeline, though, and so he keeps his eyes locked on Danny's, and pretends to hear the words that rumble through his chest as his lover continues to speak to him. He pretends that it doesn't feel as though his leg's being ripped off when Danny moves, shoved to the side by a paramedic.
Chin follows Danny's eyes, never once losing track of them, and is only dimly aware of the fracas going on around him, around the two of them. He can still feel Danny's hands on his face, and they ground him, even as his body's wrenched, and he feels like he's being torn apart.
He can see himself - face mottled with bruises, a cut on his forehead - mirrored in Danny's eyes, and it's disconcerting, dizzying. Words, like clipped and distorted sound waves from bad audio, assault him - unstable...amputate...coding...no time...kin - and he's terrified.
Chin isn't aware that he's lost consciousness until days later when he's starting to wake. There's a soft, intermittent beeping sound that permeates the air around him. It feels like the beeping is coming from him, and there's a dream of fire and bone jarring explosions, of flying through the air, and being caught by Danny and held.
Danny is Chin's lifeline, and his eyes, bruised from lack of sleep, but no less blue, are the first thing that Chin sees when he comes to; memories chasing the distorted dreams away, and bringing with them a clarity that Chin isn't sure he wants to face right now.
"Morning, love," Danny says, voice rough, eyes brimming with tears. The pad of his thumb is soft where it's rubbing against Chin's wrist, and the corner of his mouth quirks upward in half a smile. "Welcome back."
Danny's lips are warm and dry on Chin's cheek and lips, which part in expectation, and familiarity. Chin could lose himself in this. Could chase away reality with Danny's lips and mouth, the man's thumb stroking the inside of his wrist in a rhythm-less pattern that speaks of want and need, of desperation and loneliness, of fear.
"Don't you ever do that again," Danny says when he pulls back for air, breathless and juddering, the pad of his thumb biting into the inside of Chin's wrist, bruising.
Not knowing exactly what it is that he'd done - he's only got broken, half-formed images of memory in his mind - Chin nods, and smiles. "Okay," he murmurs, mouth and throat dry. It's easy to make promises to Danny.
Danny's eyes are twin sapphires, sparkling and dark with desire, with love. He nods at Chin, thumb easing up and resuming its pattern-less tracing of the inside of Chin's wrist.
"I'm not more important than you," Danny says. "I...Chin, fuck, I don't know what I'd do without you anymore. Just, I thought that Steve, and Kono were the only ones I had to worry about with their crazy ninja ways, and propensity to put themselves in harm's way; I never thought that -"
"I'm sorry, Danny," Chin says; though he doesn't remember everything, he has a good idea of what happened.
He can remember, as though viewing it in a movie, seeing Danny in the line of fire, feeling a blast of heat well before there was an explosion, and pushing the other man out of the way. Not a ninja move at all, and not something that Chin had even given thought to. He'd just acted, preserving the one person, other than Malia and Kono, and Steve, that he loved more than anything else in the world.
Danny is Chin's lifeline. Without him, the world would be colorless, and his life monotonous. And not putting himself directly in harm's way to protect Danny is a promise that Chin can't make.
A rush of heat prickles his skin, and Chin remembers the hazy moments just before he passed out, the words that were spoken in hushed, yet harsh tones, and blindly, he reaches toward the leg that had felt like it was being ripped from him. His questing fingers are met with Danny's hand, and they're pulled back, gently restrained,and Chin's staring once more into eyes so blue as to rival that of the sky on a cloudless day.
"Easy," Danny says. "The docs were able to save your leg; they've got you on some kind of nerve blocker right now, to keep the leg immobile, and to keep you from feeling the pain. You're going to be okay," Danny assures him, kisses away the tears that have fallen, unbidden, down Chin's cheeks and gathered in his ears.
"I've got you," Danny whispers into Chin's ear, thumb rubbing along the inside of his wrist, fingers twined with those of Chin's other hand, grounding him. "I've got you, love."
Chin has a moment to think that Danny's always had him, before he slips back down to sleep, and dreams, not of explosions and severed limbs, but of lovemaking on the beach, and of Danny complaining about the chafing of sand.
Danny is Chin's lifeline, and it's never more apparent than at this moment, months after the explosion that had nearly cost Chin his leg - would've cost him Danny had he not moved quick enough; and maybe that does make him just a little bit ninja - lying in bed with the man that he loves, fingers and bodies twined together in a sweaty, sticky heap; eyes the deepest blue that Chin has ever seen staring back at him, begging, and surrendering to love.