Danny and Grace
Chapter 7
Disclaimer: See chapter one
Stepping through the doorway, Steve took in the sight of his best friend lying in the hospital bed. Shock was what he felt seeing how vulnerable the injured man looked. Yea, he'd see Danny hurt before, hell just hours after meeting the man, Danny'd been grazed by a bullet, but he'd never seen his partner laid up before. If he was honest with himself, it scared the hell out of him. It seemed impossible that this was his normally over the top, boisterous partner, who's hand-waving antics as he talked often amused Steve. This, this was a whole different level of unnatural, silence and stillness were not Detective Danny Williams.
Steve moved closer to the bed, the sound of the ventilator breaking the quiet of the small room, the faint beep of the heart monitor barely heard afterward. "Danny…" McGarrett barely whispered as he took in the vivid bruising, mostly on the left side of his friend's body. A few butterfly bandages ran along Williams' brow and his chin, there was gauze wrapped around Danny's head, a slightly larger bulge just up and behind his left ear, no doubt where his head had connected with the side window. Steve glanced up toward Chin, who'd stopped at the foot of the bed, taking in the seemingly broken form of their haole.
Steve reached out and placed his hand just above Danny's wrist, making sure to not disturb the IV lines running into the back of the man's hand. Then without thinking, he laid his other hand on top of Danny's head. "Danny?" Steve spoke softly, silently praying his friend was hearing him, hoping he would feel something that told him Danny was fighting. "Hey, man…don't know if you can hear me, but you need to keep fighting okay? Grace is alive Danny…she's going to be okay and she's asking for her Danno, do you hear me? She needs her Danno, so you need to make your way back to us, to her. Do you hear me?" Steve gave his partner's wrist a gentle squeeze, hoping for a response, but knowing he wouldn't get one.
"We're getting ready to move him to the ICU now." Dr. Hale stepped into the room, a nurse and orderly just behind, "Like I said, I'm restricting visitors for at least twelve hours, but I'll come and give you regular updates after each scan."
Steve looked up at the doctor as he straightened, "Please, just make sure you keep telling him that Grace is okay. I know it's a long-shot, but if there is even a chance of him hearing, he needs to hear that."
"The staff has been informed; I promise it will be mentioned anytime someone is working with Det. Williams." Dr. Hale watched as Steve nodded, knowing the doctor would hold to his promise.
Leaning back down just a second, Steve squeezed Danny's wrist again, "Danny, I'm gonna be with Grace and I'll be back to see you just as soon as the doc let's me. Just remember that Grace is okay and needs you, you fight to get back to her."
Stepping back from the bed, Steve glanced at Chin, who gave him an encouraging nod, the older man knowing there wasn't much else they could do for the injured detective, as he too silently prayed the Steve's words were getting through.
Twelve hours passed, Steve had stayed with Grace in the PICU, daring anyone to tell him to leave, ready to pull the Governor card if need be. At the ten hour mark the doctor's felt confident enough to move the eight-year old to a regular room, McGarrett with her every step of the way. She'd woke up a couple times, neither for very long, but each time she would call out for her father, for her Danno and each time he tore at his heart and soul a little more. The final time she'd become so upset that when Steve had sat on the edge of the bed to help calm her, she slowly shifted herself toward him, wrapping her arms around his neck, crying herself to sleep against his chest.
That was how Kono and Chin found them when they returned with some much needed coffee. Once Grace had fallen asleep, McGarrett had tried to lay her back down, but her grip tightened on him, so he had carefully moved himself back, adjusting the angle of the bed where he could lean back a little more comfortably. "How's she doing?" Kono asked, sitting next to Steve's leg, placing her hand on the small girl's back.
"She almost started hyperventilating, I didn't want them to have to sedate her, when I sat on the bed to try and calm her, she crawled in my lap and wouldn't let go." Steve ran one of his hand through his hair, his finger tips pressing against his eye's then pinching the bridge of his nose. Looking at Chin he asked, "Please tell me after this much time, someone has been able to track Rachel down."
The older man sat in the chair Steve had vacated, "With it being the weekend, it took us forever to find someone in Stan's company that actually had an idea of what his schedule was. Apparently he and Rachel went to some secluded resort on one of the other island, ironically enough it was one of those places where you're not suppose to take you cell phones, laptops or anything like that. I finally got a location of the place and have sent HPD to go and pick them up, but it could still be a few hours before they get here."
The small child in Steve's arms whimpered slightly, he ran his hand over her arm, while Kono rubbed small circles on her back, the little girl quieting again. "What am I gonna tell her when she wakes up more alert?" Just as McGarrett asked that question, the door opened to reveal Dr. Hale, Danny's doctor. "How were the last set of scans?" Steve asked quietly.
Dr. Hale stopped at the end of the bed, it comforted the doctor to see the support system the small child and his patient had. Yes he knew these people were law enforcement officers, and yes he knew of the closeness that was created among colleagues, but this seemed to go even beyond that. Since the arrival of the crash victims the three people before him hadn't left the hospital, each taking a turn sitting with the young girl so she wouldn't be alone. But with each visit to update the trio on Det. Danny Williams, Dr. Hale noticed that it was the Commander that refused to leave the small child for very long. It made what he had to tell these people that much harder.
Steve, ever observant, pickup on the hesitancy of the doctor. Most of Danny's previous scans had showed steady decreasing of the swelling that was going on inside Danny's skull, but the look on the doctor's face caused the knot to twist in his stomach even more. Subconsciously he held Grace just a little tighter, somewhere in his mind believing he was protecting the young girl from the words the doctor was getting ready to utter. "What's wrong?"
Taking a deep breath Dr. Hale started, "The last scans gave us both good new and bad new. The good is that the swelling is completely gone, the pressure is back to normal levels."
"The bad?" Chin asked quietly, his calm voice betraying the emotions that were battling just below the surface, those of fear and worry.
"The bad is there appears to be a marginal decrease in some of his brain activity." The doctor responded.
"What?" Steve wasn't sure he fully understood.
"When there is a decrease in brain activity, we start to see a system's shutdown. Without the brain telling the body what it's suppose to do, it stops doing those involuntary functions that keeps us alive." The doctor watched as the realization of what he was saying finally hit the man holding the tiny girl.
"So you're saying Danny's dying?" Steve couldn't believe he was saying those words, there was no way his partner, his friend, the father of the little girl now clinging to him was dying.
Dr. Hale watched as the young woman on the bed raised her hand to her mouth, tears forming in her eyes. He watched the older man in the chair; put his hand to his head, disbelief showing in his eyes. Then he watched as the man sitting on the bed laid his head down on top of the little girls, placing a gentle kiss to her crown. "I'm sorry; there really isn't much else we can do."
The room was silent a minute, everyone absorbing what seemed to be happening, but it was a tiny voice that brought their attention to Grace Williams, "I wanna see Danno."
Steve looked down as the little girl looked up at him with tear-filled big, brown eyes. McGarrett felt his own eyes sting at the sadness he saw in the little girls look, none of them realizing she'd been awake long enough to hear what was happening with her father. Taking a deep breath, Steve looked at Kono. "Kono, go find Grace's doctor." Without hesitation she jumped up and headed out the door.
"I don't know if what you're thinking is a good idea Commander." Dr. Hale may not have been Grace's doctor but he of course had the small patients well being in mind. But he saw a determination set in the dark-haired man's face, a resolve that told anyone looking that he didn't give a crap what anyone else thought, he was going to do what the little girl had requested, come hell or high water.
Steve had started to ease himself and Grace toward the edge of the bed, Chin helping him. "Look," Steve looked at the doctor, "Grace is a smart girl, obviously she heard what we said. And if it's true then I need to take her to see her father. Like I told you before, this little girl is his life, if there is even a chance we need to take it and if God forbid he doesn't make it, she needs to see him, she needs to have this time with him." 'Time I didn't get' Steve said in his head, knowing the years he'd missed with his own father was something he would never forgive himself for, but it was also from the guilt of not being with his father in the end, never getting that last chance to tell him he loved him.
Just then Kono returned with Dr. Iona, McGarrett's voice taking on the tone of a Commander giving an order and daring anyone to question it, "I'm taking Grace to see her father."
