Cold Comfort

A/N: Here's story #3. Steve, Danny, and a stainless steel door between them.

I have two more fics ready for this series but I just finished writing this one and I think it deserves priority. Hopefuly you guys will agree.

As usual, you'll find the prompt that inspired this one at the end.

I still own nothing, and this is just for pleasure.

P.S. I have received a few interesting prompts so far, and this gives me the opportunity to say that if you have an idea for a prompt you're welcome to comment or message me about it and if I like it and think I can do a good job with it I will use it for one of the next stories.

"How's he doing?" Steve asked, tension rolling off of him in tight, palpable waves.

Lou Grover cast his gaze downwards. "Not good. We need to get him out of there, man, he's not gonna last long," he said somberly, pointing to the industrial freezer room that had trapped one of their own and turned an uneventful day into a nightmare.

Steve's hands curled into fists at his sides. Of all the team members it just had to be Danny –the antsy, claustrophobic one who couldn't sit still for more than five minutes.

"What's Akana saying?"

"Nothing. He's saying nothing. I've tried everything, but he's not talking."

Lou knew that 'everything' meant Steve had already resorted to threats and bodily harm, and he almost felt bad for the guy. Hell hath no fury like a scared, pissed off McGarrett.

"What the hell is taking them so long?"

"I don't know, man," the former SWAT Captain replied, shaking his head. "Let me find out."

Steve watched him leave, then closed his eyes and took a deep breath, heading towards the stainless steel door that separated him from his best friend.

"Danny? Hey, buddy, I'm back," he called out. "Danny?"

"Right here," came the strained, shaky voice from inside. "What's the, uh... what's the word?"

"We're waiting for the bomb squad. Lou just went to get an update." He heard a sound, as if someone had just punched a fist through a wall. "You alright?"

"No. No, I'm not alright. It's cold, and it's tight and my head hurts... I need to get out of here."

"Working as fast as we can, buddy."

Thirty minutes had already come and gone, a whole half hour that had held no results or progress whatsoever.

The old 'divide and conquer' technique had blindsided Five-0 right after storming inside a storage facility, and the next thing he knew McGarrett was staring in horror at the explosive rigging the freezer's door.

The door that had locked Danny in.

One of the perps was still at large, the other uncooperative. And the current room temperature of 0°F didn't allow them the luxury of time they so desperately needed.

"How's the wound?" he asked, trying to keep the concern out of his voice.

"Not bleeding anymore," Danny replied through the comm link after checking the makeshift bandage he had applied to his limb, and for a moment they both sighed in relief. He swallowed harshly against the dryness in his mouth and paused, long enough to come to the same realization that had just hit his friend on the other side of the door. "My whole arm is numb, I can barely feel it. That's bad, isn't it?"

Steve closed his eyes and let out a long sigh.

Yes, it was bad, but he wasn't ready to acknowledge it out loud.

"That's the cold, buddy. I bet the rest of your body doesn't feel great either. Don't worry, we're gonna get you out of there soon."

He glared at the device, wishing he could rip it off and tear it to pieces. It reminded him of the homemade bomb Ray Gardner had used to trap them inside the quarantine ward at King's and before that, of the proximity sensor-triggered explosive Hasan Farooq had strapped to himself to take out as many innocent civilians as he could.

Both times, it had been Danny's life on the line.

Both times, they'd barely rescued him in time.

"Wanna know what's frustrating?"

"What?"

"I can't even blame you this time, you weren't even there. It's my screw-up."

Steve's heart lurched painfully in his chest, the ever-present guilt flaring up at his friend's words.

"I should've been there," he admitted out loud. "It's my screw-up as well."

Danny couldn't see him, but he knew how his partner's mind worked all too well. "Don't go all glum on me, alright? There's nothing you could've done."

"It should've been me."

"And what would that have accomplished, huh? Besides a role reversal with me on the other side of this door."

"I would've found a way out."

Despite the FUBAR situation he was currently in, Danny laughed. "That's rich, SuperSEAL, even for you. You would have found a way out? With what? You got bullets that can pierce through steel? Or a laser beam to melt it?"

No comment made it past the lump in Steve's throat.

"Didn't think so. You could've done nothing either."

"I was trained for stuff like this, Danny."

"Yes, you were. Twenty years ago. Now you're just as vulnerable to extreme cold as I am, maybe even more."

Steve sighed, the unspoken reference to his deteriorating health reminding him once again how much the job had taken from him over the years.

He hadn't complained.

Not once.

Learned to adjust and live with it.

But if the job took Danny away from him...

"Have you ever... have you ever been through something like this?"

His best friend's voice shook him away from his dark thoughts. "No," Steve admitted. "But I've spent enough time in 100-degree weather to tell you that it's not a walk in the park either."

There was no reply from inside the room, and the Five-0 leader's heart skipped a beat. "Danny?" His fist started banging on the stainless steel door before his mind could even try and stop it. "Danny?"

"Still here. I'm tired, man, I just… I just had to sit down..." Fatigue had slipped into his tone as well, one of the first signs of hypothermia that Steve immediately recognized. Standing there, waiting for the next symptom on the list without being able to do a damn thing about it was pure hell.

A hell he could hardly cope with.

Jaw set, face grim, he turned around with every intention to do whatever it took to get things done and nearly collided with Lou who —bless him, had brought matters into his own hands and all but dragged the bomb squad expert right up to him.

"What's the word, Powell?"

"Not good, Commander," the EOD technician replied. He had already donned his protective gear and was staring at the homemade device with a frown on his face. "As you know, mercury switches are very tough to defuse. We have to be extremely careful or the whole thing will blow."

Steve pinned him with an icy glare, not liking where the man was going. "What are you saying?"

"I'm saying it's gonna take a while to disarm this thing."

Biting his bottom lip, he instinctively turned towards the door, wondering if Danny had heard that. He knew enough about explosives to understand that caution was the way to go. Still, he wanted to shake some sense into the guy, urging him to take things a lot more seriously than he apparently was.

Once again, Lou did that for him. "How long is a while?"

"As long as it takes."

"As long as it— listen to me, man, our friend is in there!" the former SWAT Captain replied in disbelief in his deep, baritone voice. "And I'm not sure you've noticed but this is not your regular room, it's a damn freezer, which means if we're lucky we got barely half the time you need so please start working!"

The tech's frown deepened. He looked at Grover, then McGarrett, and nodded his head. "Yes, sir."

The air was tight inside the storage room.

Or at least, that's how it felt to Danny as he struggled to breathe.

He had tried to push down the panic for as long as he could but was now quickly losing the battle, mostly due to the cold seeping into his body and messing with his brain. His chest felt tight, he couldn't draw air into his lungs and the voice he'd been holding onto, his best friend's voice, was being progressively drowned by the ringing in his ears.

The single vapor-proof fixture above him provided nothing but a dim light. Not that there was anything to see anyway. The ceiling, floor, walls and door were all covered in stainless steel, along with the two empty shelves sitting on his right. Someone had made sure to make his stay as uncomfortable as it could be, and he'd served himself on a silver platter.

Standing up on shaky legs he bent forward, resting his hands on his knees. His skin felt flushed despite the frigid temperature, fear-induced hot flashes tricking his mind into feeling like he was burning up rather than freezing.

"Danny? Danny, answer me, dammit!"

Steve's voice emerged from the haze and Danny latched onto it again.

"St—Steve?"

"Yeah, buddy, right here." On the other side of the door the Five-0 leader sighed in relief, unknowingly mirroring his partner's pose as he tried to lower his heart rate back to normal. "What's going on, huh? Thought I'd lost you there for a moment…"

"It's, uh… you need to hurry up, man, it's warm in here… I'm going to take my shirt off…"

"No no no Danny, don't do it!" Dread gripped Steve's heart in a vise and his heartbeat skyrocketed again. His wild, terrified gaze searched Lou's and he found the same amount of fear in the older man's eyes. "Hey! Listen to me, do not do it! You're not warm, you're just panicking. Just listen to my voice, alright?"

Danny's hands fumbled with the buttons, and it was only due to loss of coordination that he finally gave up his quest to get rid of the oppressive garment. "C'ntrolling son 'f a bitch…"

"Yeah, yeah, I'm a controlling son of a bitch so you listen to me, alright?"

"A'ight…"

Steve's body visibly deflated and he leaned against the door, not trusting it to keep him upright. "Good. That's' good…" His heart still hammered wildly inside his chest, and even the bomb tech who was feverishly working beside him glanced up in his direction to make sure he was okay.

A brief look at his watch told him it was now 43 minutes since Danny had been locked into the walk-in freezer. They were entering that dangerous territory where every minute counted, where even the slightest delay could make a difference between life and death.

He looked around, lost, wondering for the umpteenth time if there was something else they hadn't considered, another way in that would've saved them time. There wasn't. With walls and door four-to-six-inches thick, breaching into the cold storage was virtually impossible.

Still, Steve was determined to find it. In his mind, there was no scenario in which Danny wasn't coming home. The word 'impossible' had no meaning for him. He ran a hand through his hair and started pacing, racking his brain in a desperate attempt to find a solution.

"Can we move it?" he asked the tech a minute later as he watched him cut yet another colored wire. One of the green lights on the device stopped blinking and then turned out altogether.

The man let out a breath and nodded in appraisal. "What do you mean?"

"The bomb. Can we move it?"

"I would advise against it. I've disabled the motion sensors but there's a good amount of plastic explosive here, not to mention those mercury switches will trigger detonation if tilted beyond a certain angle or subjected to vibration."

Steve crosses his arms over his chest, nailing him with a 'I dare you' look. "I'm not asking for your advice, I'm asking if it can be done."

"Yes."

"Then do it. There's another walk-in unit upstairs, I'm gonna bring it there and lock it inside."

"Steve..." Lou warned. That was the kind of McGarrett crazy he'd never gotten used to— the desperate, last-resort plan of someone who refused to settle for anything less than what was needed.

"Commander, this is a really bad idea..."

Steve agreed with that statement. There were so many ways the plan could backfire— literally. "But it's the only one we've got. Danny has no time, we need to get him out." He looked at the bomb tech with a resolve that was both frightening and inspiring. "Tell your boys to suit me up."

"...dn't let'm do it..." the frayed, slurred voice coming from inside the freezer stopped all three men in their tracks.

"What's that?" Steve asked, moving closer and leaning forward so that his ear almost rested on the stainless steel surface. "What'd you say, Danny?"

"Don't...do it," Danny repeated, putting as much strength and conviction in his words as he could to make his point across. "Don't need your... death on my conscience."

The former SEAL shook his head in frustration.

Shit.

Of course his friend had listened.

"Danny…"

"Not… debatable. One of us needs to s-stay alive."

That was exactly what Steve, as the team leader, was trying to make sure of. Do whatever he had to do to protect his family. And Danny had so much to live for… "You still got your shirt on in there, pal?"

The blond detective looked down as if to make sure, shivering as he did so. His body had been shaking uncontrollably for the last few minutes, trying to generate as much heat as possible. "Yeah. You were right, it wasn't... I'm cold, man. So cold..."

Steve closed his eyes. "I know, buddy, I know. We're doing everything we can."

He considered ignoring his partner's request and going on with his plan, give in to the overwhelming urge to do something – anything, to get rid of the nauseating feeling of helplessness he was experiencing.

They had run out of options.

Danny was running out of time.

Beside him, the bomb tech was still hard at work, sweating into his protective gear as he felt the weight of the life-or-death situation on his shoulders.

"Never thought I'd... die like this..." Danny admitted in a half slur that sent Steve's heart sinking.

"You're not gonna die, you hear me? It's not gonna happen," he snapped, the frustration he was feeling making his words sound harsher than they were. He regretted it a second later as tears filled his eyes, overwhelmed with the ache to touch his friend, hold him, reassure him. "Come on, tough Jersey skin like yours, what's a little cold? Grover here says it's like winter in Chicago so I'm thinking home shouldn't be that different, right?"

"This is… home now. Ten years of sunshine have k-kicked the tough out of me..."

"I'm proud of you, buddy. Took you long enough to finally call Hawaii home."

Danny would never say it out loud but the days of complaining about everything and anything on the island were long gone. There were places and people that had changed his mind, and it hurt to think he would no longer see them. He was under no illusion. His chances of survival were dropping with each passing minute, and the possibility of actually getting out of there alive was almost nonexistent. Still, one last plea escaped his lips. "Get me out of here, man..." he breathed out as he sat down on the floor again and slumped weakly against the wall behind him.

The pained, desperate words hung in the air between them.

In almost ten years of partnership, Steve had never heard his partner sound like this— helpless, wrecked, defeated. Not even after Grace's accident. It cut him to the core, dredging up feelings he was not ready to handle or display for everyone to see.

"It's okay, Danny, we're almost done."

"You've never been good at… lying to me," came the feeble reply from the other side of the door. Drowsiness was slowly taking over, and unbeknownst to his conscious mind, he had already stopped shivering. Sliding further down, Danny laid on his side near the door on the cold pavement, instinctively curling up into a ball.

Maybe if he only closed his eyes a little…

"Steve…"

"Yeah."

"Make.. s-sure Charlie doesn't f-forget me..."

"Commander, we got the other suspect!"

Steve almost jumped at the unexpected voice coming through his comm link.

Junior.

On his quest to get Danny to safety, he had completely forgotten about the rest of his team.

"Where is he?" he asked in a flat monotone, features darkening at the thought of one of the men responsible for his friend's predicament.

"Outside, Sir. We just pulled up."

"Steve," Adam intercepted, urgency in his tone. "He's the one who built the bomb."

A dangerous glint lit Steve's eyes. "I'll be right out." He walked back towards the door that held his friend captive and banged his fist onto it. "Hey, Danny? I'm gonna step out for a little bit but Lou's right here, buddy, alright? He's gonna keep you company until I get back."

There was no answer from inside and the two men exchanged a worried glance.

Steve, torn between the urge to get his hands on the perp and the need to stay by his partner's side, nervously shuffled on his feet until Grover encouraged him to go. There was nothing he could do for Danny anyway, but maybe the guy could provide them with answers or a way to get out of this mess.

With renewed strength, he stalked out of the building and towards the SUV where their suspect was waiting. Opening the back door in one swift move, he took in the rapidly-forming bruises around the man's eye and jawline— a telltale sign that his teammates had already made sure he'd be compliant— then yanked him out and slammed him against the side of the vehicle, pressing his forearm against his throat and effectively cutting out most of his air supply.

"Listen to me, and listen very carefully," he hissed in a dangerously low, cold voice that made the guy squirm uncomfortably in his grasp. "The person I care about the most in the whole planet is inside that freezer, so you're gonna tell me how to defuse this bomb right now or I swear to god I'm gonna put a bullet in your head."

Without loosening his grip, his right hand reached for the SIG at his side and he jabbed it into the man's temple, the barrel scraping against his bruised skin.

"No one's gonna question me for that, no one will care. Five-0 has immunity and means, which means I can dispose of you however I please and let me tell you, man, I've been a soldier. I know how to inflict pain. Torture. I know a dozen different ways to kill a man just with my bare hands. And if my friend dies in there I promise you, you're gonna wish you were never born."

Hazel eyes, flashing with fury, bore into the criminal's soul, forcing him to look away under the intensity of the Commander's stare.

"I need to open that door. Right now."

Struggling to get air into his starved lungs like a fish out of water, the guy nodded furiously in acceptance. He'd do whatever was needed. Just as long as he could breathe.

Satisfied, though not nearly at ease, Steve dragged him unceremoniously inside the storage unit and up to the freezer door where the EOD technician was still busy at work.

"He built the bomb. He's gonna tell you how to defuse it."

Looking up through the visor of his protective helmet, the tech was unable to hide his surprise at the unexpected turn of events but gladly accepted the help.

Lou, his big frame hunched as he made arrangements through his phone, wasn't surprised at all. He quickly ended the call with a 'thank you' and approached his leader.

"EMS are on standby," he informed him. "I figured you were gonna speed things up."

Steve nodded curtly. "How's Danny?"

The older man shook his head. "Still no answer."

The statement sent the former SEAL into a spiral of panic.

It couldn't end like this, not when they were so close...

He wanted to scream, to break something, be it bones in the perp's body or the concrete walls surrounding him. Lash out at the injustice of life that threatened to take away the only person that mattered to him.

He had barely survived Joe's passing.

He wouldn't survive Danny's.

"Done," the bomb tech announced a few minutes later.

Steve's eyes widened. "Is it safe?"

"Yes."

Muttering a 'thank god' and nodding to Junior and Adam to collect the piece of thrash that had turned his worst fear into a reality, the Five-0 leader sprinted into action. Threat neutralized, he wasted no time opening the freezer's door while calling his partner's name.

"Danny? It's over, buddy, we're coming in!"

His eyes took a moment to adjust to the dim light. When they did, he stared in riveting horror at the unmoving shape curled up on the cold pavement.

"Danny?" he tried again, his voice dropping to a mere whisper. Behind him, Lou Grover quickly threw the stainless steel door open the rest of the way and followed him inside, shivering at the freezing air that assaulted them as they got in.

Steve didn't even feel it.

Drawing shuddering, terrified breaths, he stumbled backwards and shook his head in denial, trembling fingers clamping over his mouth.

Danny's face was ashen, his lips blue. He was unconscious and not shivering, a sign that his body had begun to shut down.

"No no no no... come on, Danny... come on..." he pleaded, dropping to his knees before his friend. He reached out a hand to check for a pulse and recoiled as if burned at the feeling of the ice-cold skin under his touch.

A desperate "Not yet… please don't do it..." escaped his lips as he tried again, shaky fingers running all over his best friend's body, desperate to feel a pulse. "No one's dying here today, you hear me? We got you, you're gonna be alright..."

And as Lou rushed the paramedics towards his fallen teammate, his own eyes glued to the scene in front of him, he hoped against hope that Steve was right.

"When is Danno gonna wake up, Uncle Steve?"

"I don't know, Charlie," Steve sighed, shifting in his seat by the side of Danny's hospital bed.

How was he going to explain this to a six-year old?

He had no idea what Rachel had told him about his father's condition and didn't want to frighten the child with bad news. It had been bad enough for him to wrap his own mind around it. "You know when you have a fever and you feel tired and really, really cold?" he said, hoisting him up to sit on his lap.

The boy nodded, his expression serious.

"Well, Danno got a bad cold so he needs his rest to get better."

Charlie seemed to consider the answer, his gaze shifting back and forth from his father to his uncle. "Can we stay here a little longer?"

A smile spread across Steve's face. "Of course we can." He hadn't moved in three days. Three long, excruciating days. He certainly wasn't going to leave him now. "Hey, why don't you tell him about your soccer game? I hear you did great."

Charlie's eyes grew wide. "He can hear me?"

"He can," the former SEAL reassured him, tousling the boy's hair. "And I bet he's looking forward to hearing all about it."

"Okay." Charlie hesitantly walked up to the bed and squealed in delight when he noticed his father's eyes were open. "Danno!"

Steve shot to his feet at the child's shrill cry of surprise and was beside him in an instant. And sure enough, Danny's blue eyes were staring straight at him. Swallowing against a suddenly parched throat, he placed a gentle hand on top of his best friend's one. "Hey... you're awake," he breathed out, trying to keep the shakiness out of his voice.

"Yeah," Danny replied hoarsely, a tender smile tugging at the corner of his lips as he gave Steve's hand a squeeze. "Been watching you guys. Didn't want to ruin the moment..."

Steve ducked his head, fighting against the tears that threatened to spill.

A moment later, he felt another squeeze.

Unsure, relieved, and even a little lost, he looked up again to meet his partner's gaze.

It was equally bright.

There was a lot that they wanted to say as they stared at each other, but with Charlie happily nestled between them they could only let their eyes speak.

'Thank you for not leaving me.'

'Thank you for having my back.'

'Always.'

"Danno, I scored two goals!"

Both partners smiled at the boy's ill-timed, excited share.

"You did? That's fantastic! I'm proud of you, buddy." Danny reached out and put his arm around his son's shoulders, drawing him close and placing a kiss on the top of his head. The room started to spin slightly as he moved and he closed his eyes, suppressing a groan.

Steve straightened up, ready for action. "I'll go get the doctor."

Danny shook his head and shifted a little higher in his bed. "No, wait, I'm alright. Just... a few more minutes?" he said, nodding in Charlie's direction. He had come too damn close to losing his family. Right now, he needed their presence more than he needed sleep or meds.

Steve acquiesced and helped the boy onto Danny's bed before resuming his position in the chair next to them.

The blond detective gave him a grateful smile, then focused back to his son. "Two goals, huh? I think Uncle Steve and I need to hear all about it, what do you say?"

And for the next several minutes, the child's happy voice became the only sound resonating inside the hospital room.

THE END

This was the prompt:

A is stuck in a freezing place and getting weaker by the minute due to cold and/or injuries. Over the comm, B tries his best to keep him awake and make him talk until help arrives (door's rigged with explosives/bomb, they have to defuse it before opening it), but it's too hard for him. And then his words are too weak and slurred and don't make sense anymore. And at some point he just stops responding to him.