Wow, I´m blown away by the reviews and the amount of people reading this story! Thank you so much, you totally made my day and encourage me. Here is another chapter, let me know what you think!

Disclaimer: I don´t own 5-0 sadly, or "The Lazarus child", which is an amazing book.


Two days later the situation hadn´t changed the least bit. The hope Danny had felt when Kono announced that Steve had held her hand quickly vanished when he wouldn´t react to any kind of stimulation. The doctor tried to smile assuringly but Danny preferred not to get his hopes up too high. He felt his patience quickly running through his fingers. He hated to hear the doctors say something like "needs more time", "too early to make any kind of prognosis" or "it´s up to him". He was ready to swear that if he had to listen to those fucking stupid words only once more, he´d personally hurt them!

Danny started to believe that maybe, just maybe Kono´s mind was playing tricks with her, because she desperately wanted to believe that things would be okay. Danny remembered a book he once read, The Lazarus child, in which a little girl suffered a severe brain damage after an accident. And she is stuck in a different reality, another world. So her older brother is trying to get her back from there and pull her back into the real world.

Danny somehow felt like that older brother, desperate to find a way to save her. Because that was how he felt with Steve. He knew that his partner was still in there. He wasn´t lost yet, but maybe he couldn´t find his way back. Just what could Danny do to help him? He could hardly draw any signs to attract his attention. He couldn´t give Steve a roadmap with a huge red arrow on it that says "Ohana? 5-0? This way please!"

Chin forced Kono to go home for a few hours and try to catch some sleep. She was barely able to hold herself upright and she fought with everything she still had to remain strong for her hero. But finally she gave in to Chin´s gentle pressure, especially when Danny told her that he was there to take over now. So she had pressed a gentle kiss to Steve´s cheek and left with Chin.

Danny smiled remembering her persistent struggle. She was as stubborn as can be and Danny was thankful for that. But he also saw that she needed to rest, she wasn´t helping anyone when she finally would pass out next to Steve. With a painful moan he sat down on the chair again, the very chair that he came to hate. And love. His eyes took in Steve´s lifeless form and he saw that the bruises and cuts were slowly fading, nothing more than shadows now. The white bandage on his collarbone looked somewhat out of place because it didn´t belong there. And what scared Danny was the fact that Steve´s usually tanned skin merely stood up against the white bandage.

"Have you ever read "The Lazarus child", Steve? I mean, I don´t think you ever read normal books like normal people do. You´d probably only read stuff about ammo and weapons and a lot of high tech weaponry. But this book... it reminds me a lot of this situation here." Danny gestured helplessly with his hands, thinking that Steve would probably make a face now because he was talking with his hands again. And he´d welcome even that face now, everything was better then this defeating silence.

"You know, it´s about a little girl. She´s about Gracie´s age when she was hit by a car and her brain is injured badly. Her brother was supposed to walk her to school, but he didn´t pay enough attention. And then she´s in coma and there seems to be no hope. She won´t react to anything and the family is grieving and mourning. But that little girl, Frankie, she isn´t dead. And her brother attempts to save her, to get her back." Ironically Danny didn´t realize just how much more the situation had in common with the book. It wasn´t just that he hoped that Steve was at a place like Frankie in the book was, a place that you could bring him back from.

But Danny was like the brother in a way. Of course he didn´t do it on purpose and it wasn´t because he wasn´t paying enough attention so that this had happened. But he couldn´t shake the feeling off that he wasn´t there when his partner needed him to have his back. That he should have done... something. And now he felt obliged to dive in and retreat Steve from wherever he was.

"So her brother goes to the 'other side' to find Frankie. And he... he is scared and he doesn´t know how to accomplish his mission, but he tries. He won´t give up. He never gives up on her. And in the end... in the end he safes his little sister and brings her back." Danny grabbed Steve´s hand and squeezed it hard.

"I´m gonna be your big brother, Steve. I´m gonna bring you back. I will not allow you to disappear even if it´s nice and sunny and peaceful over there, you know. I´m gonna drag your sorry ass back here just so I can kick you to the curb for pulling such bullshit. And this, my friend, is a promise!" His voice was firm and strong, full of content that he wasn´t feeling at all. But the way he was holding Steve´s hand was gentle, careful and nearly cautious.

Danny stayed silent for a few minutes and that itself was a miracle. But his thoughts went back to the moment he came home two nights before. Rachel had been there when he opened the door and just look in his face was enough. She was in his arms in an instant, holding onto him tightly. And that was the moment Danny allowed himself to let his control slip. Tears were soaking her shirt and his arms held onto her with a force that nearly broke her rips. But she didn´t protest and she didn´t complain, she stayed like that, held onto him until he finally took in a deep breath and pulled back slightly, kissing her lips gently.

"She is an amazing woman, you know. Things are so much better now and even though I know you´d say that you´ve known it all along, I´m surprised every morning I´m allowed to wake up next to her. Oh, she told me about your little conversation at our wedding, you know? How on earth did you come to that topic? I mean I shouldn´t be surprised that you´d use whatever situation you got to embarrass me but telling her that?" Danny chuckled, remembering the moment.

"She wants me to tell you that you have to get better soon. She is worried, Steve. You somehow convinced her that you are a nice guy and since our wedding her opinion about you improved... which I don´t fully understand if I might add." Leaning back in the chair he let go of Steve´s hand for a moment and rubbed over his face, trying to find something to do.

His thoughts went back to last night when he came home to Rachel after spending the whole day in the hospital.

"Hey Babe." he said, his voice was tired and exhaustion had left deep lines in his face. Rachel looked up from the book she was reading and instantly stood up and moved over to him, wrapping her arms around her husband.

She didn´t say anything, she just held him and felt him slowly relax against her. His strong arms were around her, tightly holding her against him, desperate to feel her warmth. Her lips were pressed to his temple and she wished more than anything, she could take the pain from him.

Finally he relaxed enough and pulled back slightly to look at her.

"I love you, Rach." he whispered and framed her face with his hands, kissing her gently. "I love you." he whispered again and Rachel felt tears in her eyes. She had never seen him this torn, this insecure and distraught.

"I love you too, Daniel. Always." she whispered back before his lips crashed down on hers again. The kiss quickly turned from gentle, giving and caring to demanding, hard and needy. She felt his need to be close to her and she instantly realised that words weren´t enough tonight. What Danny needed was essential and she knew that she was the only one who could give it to him.

With a tender smile she grabbed his hand and led him to the bedroom. Closing the door behind them, she pulled him down onto the bed with her. And words really didn´t mean anything because with every kiss and every touch and every caress she engulfed him in her love and gave him oblivion. The room was filled with deep breaths, throaty moans and stammered whispers. His strangled scream held not only release and love, but also pain and fear.

When she woke up hours later, she found the bed empty. She pulled over his shirt and went to look for him. And when she found him, the tears she was able to hide earlier, moistened her cheeks now. Danny was sitting on the edge of Gracie´s bed, his eyes glued to the little sleeping beauty. He was wearing his boxer shorts and a white T-shirt, his hair was still a mess. His face was wet, his eyes dark and filled with emotions. And he didn´t say a word, he just sat there staring at their daughter.

'Oh Danny.' Rachel whispered when she tiptoed back to the bedroom, giving him the privacy she knew he needed now.

Since the accident 8 days ago he was sitting in the his uncomfortable chair whenever he was awake. They didn´t work on any cases, Danny and Chin just checked in regularly, but except taking turns on Steve´s bed they didn´t really do much. And everyone was anxious, because what if they left his side only for a second and he woke up?

Danny knew that the longer Steve was unconscious the smaller the chances were that he´d just wake up as if it was a nap. The physical injuries were severe and Danny knew that this time, it was all or nothing. He might not be willing to face that truth yet, but he wasn´t stupid. And not talking about it or ignoring it wouldn´t make the reality change.

"Maybe I should ask Rachel to come here and talk some sense in you. She has a way to get under your skin and say so much just with a raise of her eyebrow, that you wanna crawl under a stone and hide there forever. Maybe that is exactly what you need, Steve. So, want me to call her? No? Yeah, I thought so..." Danny sighed and felt his patience slip.

"Damn Steve..." he whispered hoarsely and felt his eyes starting to burn. "It´s not fair, you know? Not fair that you are here being shot when you should be out there catching the bad guys. When you should tell me to get some sleep because I look like shit. Anything would be better than being here. "

Rubbing the bridge of his nose between thumb and forefinger Danny tried to prevent the tears from falling, a futile attempt but he tried anyway.

"What do you think we should do without you, huh?" Danny´s eyes lifted to Steve´s face and from the corner of the eye he saw the steady rise and fall of Steve´s chest. "I never will say this again and I´ll kill everyone who´s ever gonna reveal he heard me say this, my friend...," Oh God, no! He was not going to cry here! He was a detective, right? He had been SuperSEALs partner for the past 2.5 years. He was used to almost anything, so he was not going to cry like a baby now, no matter how much his inside was hurting!

"I won´t make it without you, Steve. So you just have to wake up and you have to get better! Please..." And no matter how much he was fighting it, a strangled sob escaped Danny´s tight chest when he dropped his head to the bed. There was only so much pain and despair a person can take and Danny felt like he reached his maximum.

And right there, in the moment of deepest pain and fear and anxiety, he felt a twitch of the fingers he was still holding onto tightly.