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Y is for Yes
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When he woke, it was slowly; the darkness ebbing away to a brightness that was so overwhelming, he dared not open his eyes again. His head throbbed, and he could feel the warmth of his own blood caked on the side of his face. It contrasted starkly against how the rest of his body felt. The cold seeped in through his pores, and he shivered uncontrollably. It must have been that slight movement that alerted his consciousness to the other inhabitant in the room.

"Steve? You awake?"

He made no attempt to answer his partner, even though he could hear the worry in his voice. He was tired, in pain, and unexplainably cold, all of which rooted him to the spot. He felt a hand on his shoulder shake him slightly, and just that small movement caused a spike of pain to flare in his head. He heard a groan echo around him, and it took him a few moments to realize that it was he who made the sound.

"C'mon, Steve, rise and shine."

Steve complied, finally squinting his eyes open once more. It took a few moments for his vision to clear and he slowly lolled his head to take in the detail of his surroundings. He was lying on the floor of small, windowless enclosure, probably 20 feet long by 20 feet wide. The room was illuminated by several exposed bulbs which gave off a bright blue iridescent glow. He could hear the quiet hum of a generator running, and could feel the chilled breeze of air circulating around him.

"Where are we?" Steve didn't miss the fact that he could see his own breath leave his lips when he spoke.

"Trapped in a giant freezer," Danny replied dryly as he squatted down next to Steve, his movements causing small clouds of fog to dance and swirl around him.

"Yeah, I gathered that much." Steve took a deep breath and pushed himself up off the floor, leaning back against the frigid wall behind him. He cast about in his flitting memories, trying to find the missing link of time between being out of the freezer and being stuck in it. "What happened?"

"I'll go with the short version," Danny said as he slowly stood. He began to pace, wrapping his arms tightly around his chest and rubbing them as he wandered in a wide circle. "We followed Moxley and his bodyguard to this place," he gestured with a wave of his arm. "We took heavy fire, you got conked in the head with a two-by-four, and went down pretty hard. I saw some light coming out from a door, dragged your ass over to it, and threw you inside. I ducked in too, thinking I'd pick 'em off once they came in."

"Only they didn't," Steve concluded.

"Nope. They shut and locked the door behind me before I realized what this room really was."

"A freezer."

"A death trap is more like it."

Steve ignored Danny's pessimism. "How long was I out?"

"About thirty minutes."

Steve nodded, the pain once again grounding him to the spot. Reaching up a hand, he tentatively poked and prodded his head, trying to assess the damage. He was still bleeding, though the flow seemed to have slowed. Head wounds were notoriously known as heavy bleeders, making them appear worse than they actually were. That hardly reassured him, though, as another drop of blood trickled down the back of his neck. Steve knew that he didn't have time to worry about himself and his wound. He had to focus on getting him and Danny out of here alive.

First option: find a way out.

Using the wall for support, Steve slowly got to his feet, swaying for a moment, before heading directly for the locked door. He pushed his weight against it, but it didn't even budge. Next, he tried ramming his shoulder against it, but again, there was no give.

"Hey!" Danny shouted, jogging to Steve's side when he saw his partner wince against the pain. "I already tried that. It's sealed from the outside."

"I have to try something, Danny," Steve said.

"I know that," Danny responded with the air of someone speaking to a small child. "But I've already tried everything I can think of. And, in case you've forgotten, you are bleeding. From the head. Don't further injure yourself trying to ram through the wall, okay?"

Steve noticed his Sig on the ground a few feet in front of him. Pushing away from the wall, he walked over, retrieved his weapon, and spun around, firing at the door's mechanism in hopes to damage it enough to kick it open.

"NoNoNo!" Danny yelled. "Are you trying to kill us?"

"Danny, we're going to freeze to death if we don't get out of here, okay? Do you understand that?"

"Of course I understand that!" Danny yelled again, taking a step closer to his partner. "But if you haven't noticed, these walls are made of steel. Bullets like to ricochet off of steel. So cut it out!"

Steve's shoulders slumped and he sighed heavily. Perhaps escape from within wasn't a possibility after all.

Second option: alert someone to their presence.

Steve reached into his back pocket and pulled out his cell. No bars. He walked from one end of the freezer to the other; first reaching up high, and then down low. Still no reception. He turned to look at Danny, who was still rubbing his arms absently in the center of the room.

"You have any bars on your phone?"

"No," Danny reported, but made no effort to check.

"But you didn't even…"

"Have you not been listening to me? I said I already tried everything, okay?" Danny had never sounded so defeated, and Steve, despite his training demanding him to keep trying something… anything… was forced to accept that perhaps there was no way out of this situation.

Third option: find a way to survive until help arrives.

Steve noticed a thermometer over Danny's shoulder, and he pointed. "What's the temp in here?"

Danny narrowed his eyes at his partner before turning around and glancing at the device. "Minus 10 degrees Fahrenheit."

"Okay," Steve nodded, pocketing his cell. "That's useful information, thank you."

"How is that useful?" Danny demanded, thrusting his arms out in front of him.

"Well, it means that we've got probably two hours before we freeze to death, a quarter of which has already passed."

Danny's mouth gaped open before it closed again. "Oh, yeah. Quite useful, thanks."

Steve made his way to the side of the freezer, leaned his back against it, and slowly slid to the ground. He pulled his legs up to his chest and wrapped his arms around them, attempting to retain as much body heat as possible. It was nearly impossible to control his shivering now, and he noticed Danny was unable to either.

"Come here," Steve told his partner, gesturing to his left. "We need to stay still and huddle together."

"Excuse me?"

"To retain body heat. Your pacing around is depleting your body's energy reserves. We need to huddle together," Steve repeated, "so we can delay the onset of hypothermia."

"Let me guess. One of your classified missions took you to Antarctica," Danny grumbled, but he complied, sliding down next to his partner so they were side-by-side, their shoulders touching.

"No. But I did have to go through something similar in SEAL training."

"Of course you did," Danny replied, his teeth beginning to chatter. "Freezing to death in Hawaii. What a way to go."

"We're not dead yet." Steve tried to put as much conviction into that simple statement as he could, but he knew it fell flat. "Listen, we need to stay awake. We stay awake, we can stay alive."

Danny nodded. "Until Chin and Kono can find us."

Steve looked at his friend and saw the skepticism in his eyes. They both understood that the chances of Chin and Kono finding them were slim. But they'd never given up a fight before. And now would be no different. Pulling his legs up tighter to his chest, Steve watched as Danny also pulled his legs up, resting his head against his knees and wrapping his arms tightly around both so that his face was hidden from view. His body shook uncontrollably against the cold. Steve reached out and put an arm around Danny's shoulders, who immediately tensed.

"What are you doing?" Danny demanded without lifting his head, his voice muffled from beneath his arms.

"Keeping us warm. Get over it, Danno."

Danny didn't move away and the two of them sat in silence for a few moments, trembling against the cold that weighed heavily on them both.

"How's Gabby?"

"How's Catherine?"

Steve managed to smile at Danny's immediate redirection. It had been ages since he'd heard Danny mention the museum curator's name.

"She's good," Steve replied. "She arrived on the island this morning."

"So I can expect you to be grinning like a goof for the next few days?" Danny asked, his eyes now peeking out from behind his arms.

"Something like that," Steve agreed. Neither needed to add 'if we get out of here'… they were both thinking it. Steve cleared his throat. "Actually, I, uh, I was planning on proposing."

Danny slowly lifted his head to look at his partner. "Really?"

"Really."

"Huh," Danny said, burying his head back into his arms.

"What do you mean, 'huh'?" Steve questioned. This time, Danny straightened; his head leaning back slightly against Steve's arm.

"Nothing," Danny defended. "So, are you going to propose while jumping out of a plane together? Or while wrestling a shark?"

Steve snorted. "No." Then he paused. "Actually, I hadn't thought how I was going to propose yet, but I want it to be perfect. I was hoping you could give me some pointers."

"Me? Why me?"

Steve looked him in the eyes. "Because you're my best friend, Danny. And I was hoping you'd be my best man." Steve watched as a wave of emotion crashed on his partner's face. Danny smiled and nodded, and Steve continued. "Besides, you've gone through this before. How did you get Rachel to say yes?"

"Oh, yeah, cuz that ended so well," he smirked through shivering lips. Danny began to fidget, his arms rubbing up on and down on his thighs in a futile attempt to warm them. Eventually he stopped, re-wrapping his arms around his torso. "I had planned a really romantic evening. Our favorite restaurant. Champagne. Hotel room. The whole nine yards. It was going to be perfect. Then… well, then 9/11 happened." Danny paused, and Steve allowed him the moment. He had never thought about where Danny had been on that fateful day… or how he could have been affected. He was certain, based on the look in his partner's eyes, that he was reminiscing on more than just his botched marriage proposal.

"Anyway," Danny continued, "my precinct was called in to help… with… y'know… and I had to leave for the city pretty quickly. I didn't know when I'd be back, s…so I ended up proposing on the steps leading up to Rachel's apartment. Not exactly the m…most romantic gesture, but she said yes. She said y...yes, and I couldn't believe it." Danny shifted so he could face Steve. "Are you sure you want to m…marry her?"

Danny's speech was beginning to slur, so it was hard for Steve to tell if Danny was being sarcastic. But his eyes reflected only curiosity and sensitivity.

"Y…Yes," Steve shivered. "I'm sure."

"Then that's… that's all that matters." Danny resumed his spot against the wall with some difficulty, his face turned away from Steve. "Forget about th…the perfect proposal. All you n…n…need is the girl."

They fell once again into silence that was only broken by the sounds of their haggard breathing. Steve was unable to keep track of the time that passed. Minutes… hours…. No matter how much had passed, he knew that they had too little of it left. His shivering had completely stopped and he could no longer feel the cold around him or within him.

"I'm s…s…sorry."

Steve almost didn't hear his partner; Danny's voice was so quiet. He, too, had stopped shaking with the cold, and Steve knew that their time was precariously short.

"Why?"

"For… for g…getting us s…stuck in th…this fr… freezer."

"It's…s…s… n…not your fault, Dann…nnno."

Beside him, Danny minutely shook his head. "C… can't f…f…feel…"

Steve's heart dropped as he watched Danny's head slump forward. He tried to lift his right arm to check his friend's pulse, but his muscles were too stiff and refused to cooperate. What little energy he had left was draining rapidly from him, and he couldn't prevent his own eyes from drooping shut.

He thought of Catherine. Forget about the perfect proposal. Danny was right. He'd never been much of a planner, anyway, preferring to do things in the moment. He knew that the right moment… the perfect moment… would be the next time he'd look upon her face. Steve closed his eyes and wished he would have had that chance to look upon her…

…just one last time.

When he woke, it was slowly; the fog in his mind ebbing away to a brightness that was so overwhelming, he dared not open his eyes again. He expected his head to explode in pain, yet there was none… only the blissful sensation of floating. It contrasted starkly against how the rest of his body felt. The heaviness and exhaustion pulled him downward, and he fought against the urge to slip back into the endless fog, groping outward for anything to cling to. It must have been that movement that alerted his fight with unconsciousness to the other inhabitant in the room.

"Steve? You awake?"

Steve wanted to answer his partner; the worry in his friend's voice bothering him. But he was tired and unexplainably sluggish… both of which prevented him from forming a coherent sentence. He felt a hand on his shoulder shake him slightly, and he heard a groan echo around him. It took him a few moments to realize that it was he who made the sound.

"C'mon, Steven. Wakie wakie."

Steve complied, finally squinting his eyes open once more. It took a few moments for his vision to clear and he slowly lolled his head to take in the detail of his surroundings. He was lying on a narrow bed that was nearly too short for him. The room was dimly lit by a single lamp positioned directly to Steve's left. The pale walls were bare except for a small television mounted on one wall and a single window with its blinds closed. He could hear the soft, constant beeping of a monitor, yet felt nothing but warmth around him.

"Where are we?"

"In the hospital," Danny replied as he eased slowly back into the chair next to the head of Steve's bed.

"Yeah, I gathered that much." Steve took a deep breath and tried to push himself up before Danny stopped him, pushing a button allowing the bed to rise. Steve cast around in his sluggish memories, trying to find the missing link of time between being trapped inside the freezer and being out of it. "How did we get out?"

"Well, I'm not entirely sure," Danny said as he scratched his chin. Steve noticed how Danny's face was slightly reddened and swollen, and how his voice seemed a bit lower than normal. "Chin tells me that he and Kono tracked us by using the GPS on the car. Once inside, they saw the light seeping out from underneath the freezer door, opened it up, and found two human popsicles inside."

Steve ignored Danny's misdirected humor. "How long have I been out?"

"About six hours."

Steve nodded. Reaching up a hand, he tentatively poked and prodded his head, remembering his wound. He felt a large bandage secured to his head, but other than that, everything seemed to be in order.

Danny waited until Steve was done examining himself to ask, "How do you feel?"

"Like I've been freezer burned."

"That's actually pretty accurate," Danny smiled. "Listen, you've got a guest waiting for you outside. I just wanted to see how you were doing before heading out."

"You leaving?" Steve asked.

"Yeah. I got discharged a few hours ago. You got banged on the head pretty good, so I think they'll want to keep you a little longer for observation. Don't give the nurses a hard time, okay?" Danny stood and reached out his hand. Steve clasped it and they shook for a moment. "Good luck, buddy."

"Good luck? What are you…?" Steve was cut off as the hospital room door swung open and Catherine strolled through. Danny threw his partner one last look, and with a smile, slid out the door.

"Hey, sailor," Catherine smiled as she walked toward Steve. She bent over and kissed him, and Steve breathed in her warmth, her scent, and her touch as he cupped his hands around her face. Pulling away, her smile vanished as she took in the tears in his eyes. "Are you okay?"

"Yeah," Steve managed as he took her hand in his. "There's just something I need to ask you."

Outside in the hall, Danny hovered near the door, listening intently. He couldn't hear what Steve was saying, just the timber of his voice rising and falling. There was a sudden light squeal and muted laughter. Danny walked away, a large grin on his face. It was obvious he'd proposed, and she'd said yes.

Steve had his girl. And nothing else mattered.