I do not own Hawaii Five-0 or any characters. No copyright infringement intended.
Notes: Coda / Episode Tag for Season 4, episode 19 Ku I Ka Pili Koko. Because the muse is multi-tasking even with a wonderful mega-story - Hoa Aloha - which is still in progress with TheDogo! (BTW, more is coming VERY SOON now that THOSE muses (mine actually) have been beaten into submission (sort of) because they stopped playing nicely in the sandbox).
Special thanks here to Fifilla who helped rationalize some of the medical things. And of course CinderH who also manages to title things that I can't, PLUS who manages to multi-task even with the demands of too many crazy muses to count! (umm yeah, mine again!)
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CHAPTER ONE
He fell hard. Slick, sweaty flesh to hotly baked, acrid concrete. So stunned, his brain short-circuited and all that came out was a rush of his last breath in one fell swoop. Even with a subtle limp, he'd missed their fleeing teenage culprit by a hairs-breadth of a filthy gray t-shirt. Then he'd simply fallen like a kid at playground who's feet got tangled in haste to go ass over tea-kettle.
Danny heard the buzz in his earpiece but couldn't catch his breath to reply. The chatter from the rest of his team was fast and his brain slow to cooperate. He only understood that Chin had picked up on their perp's trail and had him now firmly in hand.
"Report. Danny." Steve's voice echoed in his head at first all business, then agitated and finally settling on downright worried.
"Danny! Report! Where are you?"
His return to work was recent after the treacherous building collapse which had resulted in a badly bruised right leg and a piece of rebar that had taken up a short residence in his side. It felt too soon now that he lay prone on an overly heated sidewalk only inches from a secondary road.
"Danny. Answer me!" Steve was nothing if not persistent and Danny's forehead creased in concentration as sweat ran down his cheeks. A slow whistling breath finally agreed to enter his lungs while he forced one hand to move to his communications link.
"Here… side alley… Good." Danny breathed out the untrue words. He coughed uncomfortably and then wished he had another bottle of water for his mouth and throat which felt like they were coated in dry chalk. In fact, Danny had a fresh bottle in the car; sitting right in the middle of the console. Cold, unopened and definitely with his name on it. He only needed a few seconds with it before it could join the three others already drained and tossed haphazardly to the back seat.
Planting his hands palm down as grit rubbed into skinned forearms, he tried once and then twice to push upwards, but his body refused to listen. Confused as to why he couldn't quite get moving, instead of wishing for water, Danny changed gears. Hanging his head limply towards the sidewalk, he focused solely on breathing while he waited for help to arrive.
"M'good." Eyes closed, Danny whispered into his hands as his teams' voices continued their discordant babble. Talking over and through each other, he stopped trying to decipher their individual words. It was difficult enough to suck in a small trickle of over-heated, humid air when the fist of pain in side began to flare more loudly.
"Yeah, m'good. Need a sec." He forced out the words just as the over-sized forbidding shape dropped next to his side. Half-heartedly trying once more to find leverage, Danny's whisper ended on a pained wheeze. Moving was definitely a bad idea as the fist became a solid brick of unyielding pressure.
"Bullshit." The worry in Steve's voice was no longer echoing in Danny's communications device, but virtually in his very air space. "Don't try to move." Danny would have smiled had he found the energy to counter Steve's upset demands, orders and questions. "Stay down. What happened?"
"Just .. tripped." Danny wheezed into the dirty concrete while he felt Steve's hands purposefully tracing his right side. The same place where a bandage still graced the wound that a rusted piece of rebar had made when it pierced his skin. Still healing, it was sore and bruised looking but hadn't been much of a problem. His only complaint earlier that day was being tired from a fitful, restless night where he finally had pulled himself out of bed in a resentful feeling of being not quite right with the world. But he'd shaken it off, skipped coffee in lieu of water, and gone into the office as always in his very punctual manner.
"Boss?" He groaned in disgust as Kono joined them, equally worried about Danny's predicament and health. "What happened?" She stood over them watching as Steve carefully removed Danny's tac-vest.
"Gangs .. all .. here." Danny wheezed uncomfortably, still astonished that he had zero desire to move as Steve's hands roamed the healing wound and then trailed down to his bruised right leg.
"Says he fell." Ignoring his partner's continued mutterings, Steve answered Kono instead. He frowned when his fingers connected with a section of Danny's side that not only made him hiss in discomfort, but also seemed more sticky than damp from sweat.
"Help me … up." Danny tried again as a firm hand settled between his shoulder blades to officially decline the request. At first cooler when his vest was removed, the warmth from Steve's hand made the heat from his sweat-laden shirt feel so much worse. Yet seconds later, Danny had an ill shiver shake him.
"Bullshit." Speaking more to himself, Steve was stuck on the one word in utter disbelief as a fevered heat rose up from Danny's body. Glancing to Kono, he made no move to do what Danny asked. Rather, he demanded that she get help to their location.
"We need an ambulance. He's over-heated… his side … it's swollen where the rebar went in. I can feel it under the bandages." Steve's conversation with Kono occurred completely over Danny's bowed head as he gasped, flinched and tried to move away from Steve's probing. Absorbing each word though, Danny completely disagreed as he tried to lift himself up off his forearms.
"If you .. won't .. help me." Danny panted and winced as bits of street gravel tore into his skinned arms. "I'll do it .. myself." But he was hissing again as a sharper and much deeper ache settled in his abdomen.
"Or, maybe not." Admitting his failure with a worried cough which only sparked more pain, Danny groaned into his fist. "What the hell … is going on?"
"You tell me, partner." Steve tightened his restraining hand on Danny's back to further prevent his partner's attempts at moving. "Stay down for a minute. Something's wrong … why didn't you say anything earlier?
"Felt .. fine. Just .. not sure… what's going on .. now." Too exhausted to roll his eyes, Danny was just as confused. The general truth was that he had felt mostly fine up until the perpetrator had taken off. Other than a malaise and lack of hunger, he'd been relatively productive at work. His first real exertion had brought on the startling realization that he might have a more physical problem.
He was bone-tired, possibly more thirsty than usual, and maybe just a bit under the weather with a lazy appetite to match. But nothing specific or so worrisome that he thought he had a real concern.
With the heat of the day though and then his attempt at a sprint, Danny felt off kilter just before a sharp pain stabbed into his side and spread at an alarming rate from right to left to settled more central to his belly. It waned as quickly as it had come. So, he'd kept on doggedly down the alley and across the sidewalk only slightly favoring the dull, stiff aches in his bruised right leg.
Then he didn't even remember the reason for his not so dramatic fall to the pavement. First he was up and reaching for the kid, and then he simply wasn't on his feet. Initially merely jarred by the heavy connection to the stifling heat of the pavement, more pain was beginning to take up a definite residence off-center to his original injury.
Becoming afraid to move lest it spark more sharpness, he allowed his head to sag forward onto his fisted hands. He couldn't bite back the moan as a sudden knife-like ache rippled from under the bandage, deeper into his middle. This time it refused to abate and Danny wound up panting in agony.
"What … the hell?" Biting his lip as it all worsened, Danny screwed his eyes more tightly closed while trying to sink away into the heat of the concrete. Steve was gently prodding the bandage again and he shook his head as the touch triggered another aching wave.
"Not .. helping. So, not .. helping." He moaned painfully, but Steve finally stopped his careful ministrations.
"Alright, Danny. Help's on the way and we'll get this figured out." Steve quietly stressed. Danny didn't know how good that actually was because his partner was calm. Much too calm, even-toned and patient; each of which separately typically spelled disaster; or in the very least, something quite wrong.
Silently Steve held up two fingertips for Kono to see over Danny's prone and splayed body. Touched with reddened droplets of blood, the tender scab had reopened and evidence of skinned road rash traced along his partner's forearms.
"On it, boss. Four minutes out now." Already on the phone demanding an ambulance, Kono looked up as Chin came their way pushing their errant teenaged felon.
"Ambulance?" Brow furrowed, Chin maintained his death grip on the arrogant teen who was less than impressed with all the goings on.
"What happened to Danny?" He asked when Kono ended the call.
"Says he fell .. he definitely reopened his wound. Something else is wrong though. Steve said there's a swelling and Danny's in a lot of pain. He can't get up." Kono glared warningly at the teenager's cackled laugh before giving him a hard shove in the shoulder. He stumbled backwards into Chin who then nearly throttled his neck to carelessly keep him on his feet.
"What was that? Do you have something to say?" Kono's voice was low and threatening. "Maybe there's something you need to tell us?"
"Nah, sista. Not a word." Unrepentant, the teenager narrowed his dark eyes right back into her face with a leer. "Wasn't me at all. Can't help it if the man can't keep his feet under him."
"Watch it." Chin ground out in warning as he pulled him away towards an HPD cruiser just arriving on scene. "If you're going to keep your mouth shut because you have literally nothing of value for us to hear, then I'd suggest you begin now."
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"This is … stupid." Danny huffed in annoyance as he battled his body's odd feelings. Sirens were coming closer and he resented the sound. Not that he could have on his own, but Steve was additionally preventing any movement whatsoever which was exacerbating his feelings of helplessness.
"Oh .. wow.. sick." Suddenly lethargic and more nauseous than thirsty, Danny ground his forehead roughly into his fisted hand. "Gonna be sick."
"Try to breathe through it. Slow and steady." Unsure of how to help except to keep his partner down and quiet, Steve's eyes widened with worry. "Geez, Danny.'
"Ahh. Maybe .. Steve." The dull ache in his side began to worsen with a vengeance to a sharper point and he struggled once more to keep a surge of needing to actually upchuck his light lunch at bay.
He heard Steve's worried curses as he gagged once, then twice only to dry-heave into his fist. "Shit, Danno. What did you do?"
"Steve?" Bewildered by his body's odd changes, Danny mumbled his partner's name more as a question. He focused on the strong hand ever present on his back and sensed Steve moving closer to enter more of his personal space. Another shudder ran through his body and Danny grimaced as he realized he'd kept his eyes closed the entire time. He hadn't opened them once since he had fallen. Panting harshly into his hands, he was sure that it was safer to stay that way.
"Just relax, Danno." Steve could feel the pained shudders increasing through Danny's back. "Concentrate on breathing slowly. You've been taking the antibiotics right?"
The question was ridiculous because that was something Danny certainly wouldn't risk, but Steve was too well aware of possible alternatives. He knew that Danny had been following doctors post followup care like clockwork. As expected, Steve saw the faint nod as he stayed anchored on his knees next to his prone and clearly struggling partner.
Sirens were pulling up quickly and he rubbed a small circle on his Danny's back as another tremble ran through his body.
"We'll get you fixed up in no time." Steve murmured. "Probably just tore a stitch or two." The excuse sounded poor though coming off his lips. Danny seemed to agree as a strangled half-laugh and half-coughed groan rattled his shoulders.
"It'll be okay. It will." Immensely worried, yet unable to come up with a single reason other than something related to Danny's recent injury, Steve's mind raced through any number of frightening scenarios.
~ to be continued ~