Chapter 4

It was still night when he had awoken, the raven haired boy couldn't sleep. It was obvious he was troubled, and the blonde haired boy needn't say a word but rather, flip on the lights with a worried expression to show his concern.

"Danny... You've been waking up again and again over three times now, what's wrong?"

His friend didn't reply, not even a movement besides the faint heart beats the jock could feel clutching Danny close in his arms. He remembered the first few times the younger teen had awoken in his arms, he couldn't breathe and was gasping for air while struggling in Dash's hold.

"Danny... Talk to me."

Again there wasn't a reply, even when Dash had flipped him face to face, the boy was empty with feeling. Dark blue eyes stared into azure, but couldn't see anything, there was no joy, despair or anger... Just a void.

"Danny please."

He raised both his hands to the younger boys shoulders, he shook him to get some form of reaction but Danny was a statue. The only response was the closing of his eyes, before he collapsed forwards into Dash's chest.

"Danny!"

The blonde teen brought up the raven haired boy's form, his hand pressed firm onto his chest but something was amiss.

"No no no... Danny..."

With his spare hand rustling upwards quickly, he raised it to the younger teens neck to read a pulse, nothing. He followed the confirmation below his nose, but there was no breathing.

"Oh my god, no Danny!"

It took a second of realization that Danny's heart had stopped beating. In panic Dash jumped off the bed, lifting Danny to his bare chest, he carried him one arm under the knees while the other around his shoulder.

"Mom! Call an ambulance now!"

Ms. Baxter seemed to spring into action the moment she heard the sentence, she hadn't slept yet but she knew urgency in her sons voice. Her hand darted to her bedroom phone, stabbing three times before being answered almost immediately.

Dash made his way to the living room, dropping Danny in the centre where he had the space. His hands made their way to peel off Danny's T-shirt violently tearing the fabric, before his hands creased together and pressed over his friends heart.

He vaguely remembered the CPR exercise before, it was mandatory when Dash took Sports Med. He assumed a majority of things he learned in the class would never be applied, besides the occasional bandaging but he was thankful anyway that he had learned the basic gist of it now.

Though regardless of how much pressure he applied to Danny's chest, it didn't seem like anything was happening. The boy was still not breathing. Pressing on to the second condition, Dash forced his lips down onto Danny's breathing out with no effect. He was panicking himself now, as he continued to gaze at a pale Danny Fenton.

"Dash what's going on?! What happened to Danny!"

It was more like a demand for an answer rather than a question, his mother stared onward at Dash from above the stairs as he replied without turning. His entire attention was on Danny.

"I don't know, he stopped breathing. And now... I don't know what to do."

He finished his sentence almost in tears, the Dash Baxter at school never cried especially not for Danny Fenton but it wasn't that scenario. In fact it might never be that scenario, if Danny was out of the picture from here on, he couldn't bear the feeling of losing the one person he might actually love.

"Please don't die... Danny, I-"

His hands wrapped around the unconscious raven haired boy, tears streaming down his face and onto the pale teens cheeks. He held him as close as he could, the heat of his own body against the cold touch of Danny's breathless skin.

"I love you."

His wet eyes blurred his vision, but he could barely make out the second of a flashing neon green over Danny's lifeless sapphire eyes, and the sudden shift of ebony to white of his hair. But it was indifferent the moment he blinked to clear his tears, he wasn't even aware his mom had opened the door for the medical team in the ambulance.

It was so silent when they arrived maybe he hadn't heard the siren, but it was clear in the draped window of the living room he could make out the flashing blue and red. He continued to stare at Danny, even when he was spoken to and pulled away to let go as the raven haired boy was placed onto a stretcher.

Everything was mute except the heartbeat he remembered the boy had, only moments ago in his arms. Something had happened. Something horrible was wracking Danny in his sleep, and it seemed to have won against him. Then sound came back in a blast of reality, as Dash stood up in his shorts and grabbed a light jacket from the couch.

"Can I come with you?"

"Yes, are you related to him?"

"He's my boyfriend."

He glanced towards his mom away from the paramedic as she nodded in approval, it wasn't just if she needed him or him, her. It was her son being honest, and accepting of everything that he was unsure before. She was proud of him and in her heart, she knew his father was too. But most importantly, what Ms. Baxter knew most was that Dash needed Danny to be safe and Danny needed her son to wake up alive and well.

It was a fairly short departure and arrival to Amity Park Hospital, Dash recognized the place for his own minor sport injuries but he'd never needed to enter the Emergency Department. The paramedics had already tried to defibrillate Danny twice, but it didn't seem to work. They needed more advanced hospital technology, which the ambulance simply lacked.

While the paramedics and Dash exited the ambulance, Dash only gripped on harder to Danny's hand as they passed the main hall of the Emergency Department. They continued down another hallway, turning right twice before entering a vacant room to which Dash was told to standby outside.

He let go Danny's hand for what could've been the last time he felt it, and it broke him into tears once more. With doctors sweeping into the room in a short notice, Dash could only hope that they could bring his true love back from his unconscious state. He could hear countdowns in the room, before the buzzing sound of electricity and a stamping emission.

The blonde waited for what seemed like an hour before the first doctor exited the room, and he rose to his feet to ask on Danny's status.

"How is he? Is he okay?"

The jock brought dry hands to his damp cheeks, brushing away what seemed to be a river of sadness. He was preparing himself for relief or a crushing disaster, but the next words that answered him seemed to rip into Dash another way.

"We don't know."