Got to say I'm totally overwhelmed with the feedback I've been getting for this. It means a huge amount so thank you all. I'm getting through the backlog and will finish replying to everyone later!

Here's the next chapter. It's a bit cheesey bordering on melodramatic nonsense. Apologies. Don't give up the day job, Swifters.

CHAPTER 6- TRUST, FEAR AND DEMONS

"You're okay, Danno. I've got you. You're safe."

Danny lay on his bed, curled on his side, his face covered with one hand as he listened to Steve's murmured words. He counted silently to himself in a quest for temporary escape. He tried not to think. Tried to shut out those two faces he had been able to point out to Steve with absolutely no hesitation whatsoever. Tried to shut out the many nightmare-like memories that went hand-in-hand with them.

But his mind was buzzing and he couldn't switch off.

Danny needed to zone out, just for a while, after seeing those men again. He needed that mental retreat. Steve seemed to know what he needed, Steve always seemed to know what he needed. He had picked Danny up and carried him back over to his bed. He'd pulled the sheet over him and sat down beside him, held his left hand and rubbed those fifteen scars because Danny needed that too. He was counting for him again now, his voice soft.

But Danny couldn't switch off this time, it simply wasn't working.

Steve was trying his best to help him. Maybe that was part of the problem, because Steve was the quite simply the cornerstone of his tenuous mental stability and now… now Danny was having to completely re-define their relationship in his mind.

Danny's life had seemed simple to him. For the part of it he could currently remember he had been told he was a possession, treated like a possession. He had no choices, no valid opinion. That was not something he had thought to question and he had suffered silently. Then, out of nowhere, Steve had appeared by his side.

When Steve had come on the scene, drawing Danny out of himself one tiny bit at a time, Danny had no reason to think his own status had changed, for all the nature of the man who had him was like nothing he could recall experiencing before. Steve had been nothing but kind. He had earned Danny's trust by counting with him and he had never betrayed it, not once. Steve still counted with him every single time he needed it. He helped Danny when he needed help, he didn't punish him when he did the wrong thing. He took care of him and protected him from the other people around them, made sure they didn't come too close until Danny was ready for it. He had even held Danny when it all got too much, when he had cried on the plane. Steve had wrapped his big arms around him and Danny hadn't even felt trapped. He'd felt comfort.

But until today Danny had had every reason to fear Steve too, because he had been with Steve before. Danny might not remember it, but Steve had told him all about it so he knew it must be true. But then, for some unknown reason, that had changed. Danny had assumed he must have done something wrong- he didn't know what, but it must have been very bad indeed for Steve to let those other men take him. So Danny had tried his very hardest to please Steve so things wouldn't change like that again, so Steve wouldn't get angry and send him away. So he would keep Danny because Danny did not want to go back to where he had been before, that stinking prison cell with the tainted water and the cruel, cruel men.

He wanted to stay with Steve.

But now everything had been turned upside down. Steve didn't own him at all. Nobody did, or ever had. No one was allowed to hurt him at all.

It was a lot to take in.

Steve was his friend. Steve had used that term before; 'friend'. And 'partner'. But Danny had assumed that was just part of his uniquely benevolent approach to ownership. When Steve had used those words Danny hadn't even considered the possibility that the man was being literal for a single second.

But if Steve didn't own Danny, Steve had no obligation to him and that was terrifying in itself. What was holding him here, other than the memory of a friend who was now, to all intents and purposes, dead? What was stopping him leaving Danny here alone, going away to drink that drink he had smelt so strongly of until Danny's clumsy, accidental reprimand?

Danny tried to picture how he might cope on his own and his breaths came thick and fast, His mind looped in circles, anxiety blooming into panic. He really, really needed to shut down.

But he couldn't manage it, he couldn't get those barriers up! His mind began to race, filling with flashbacks of those two men he had picked out and others besides. Of what they had done to him while they laughed at him, spat on him. And his newly gained knowledge- the knowledge that they had lied, he did not belong to them and he should never, ever have been treated like that… in a way that made it seem worse. The pain and humiliation he had experienced had become expected, almost accepted. But now… slowly, slowly it was dawning on him that he had been a victim. That the actions of those men had destroyed his old life. Destroyed him.

He was wrestling with inklings of an entirely new feeling. He was starting to feel angry. It had been born when Steve underlined the reality of what had happened to him, told him that the men had had no right to hurt him at all. It had gifted him the wherewithal to seize the initiative in the moment and identify them… but now he wasn't sure how to cope with it.

It wasn't fair. None of it was fair! It wasn't fair that they had done those things to him, it wasn't fair that they had hurt him until his mind had shattered, it wasn't fair that the memories he was left with were of them and the things they had done to him, not of the people Steve had told him he used to love and could still trust. Not even of Steve.

Danny curled up tighter, counted furiously. One to fifteen, one to fifteen, over and over and over again, his fingers joining Steve's to rub those fifteen scars on his thumb frantically as he tried desperately to zone out.

He just couldn't do it.

He stopped trying, exhausted. He let his thoughts and feelings wash over him without trying to find that semi-conscious escape. He let himself listen to Steve's voice counting for him, murmuring reassurance. He let himself begin to believe that Steve really was going to stay with him. He started to accept he couldn't be sent away again even if he got things mixed up, or if he was too tired to try hard enough, or if he said the wrong thing. The minutes rolled by and Danny's pulse started to slow, his head began to clear.

Danny blinked his eyes open, looked up at Steve's pale, anxious face. Steve looked ill and that… that was all wrong. He wished he knew how to fix it.

Steve- his friend. The man who wasn't here because he was trying to fix his reclaimed property. The man who really would never hurt him, never punish him. The man who was here because he wanted to be. He wanted to help Danny through all of this shit, all these bewildering fears and thoughts and feelings, to help him negotiate the fractured wasteland of his mind and find a way to exist. And why? Simply because he was Danny's friend. That was it.

Trust and fear- those disparate feelings had defined his relationship with Steve to this point. But now… he had nothing to fear from Steve at all. Only trust was left.

It occurred to Danny that he must have been someone pretty special to have earned a friend like Steve. And he might not remember the person he used to be but, he resolved, he would do his damndest to become someone deserving of that friendship again.

Danny cleared his throat, really, really wanting to express all of those sentiments but knowing that was still well beyond his grasp. He smiled weakly instead and whispered two simple words...

"Th-thank you."

…

Steve sat perched on the edge of Danny's bed. Filled with pride yet still crippled with concern, he couldn't move his gaze away from his partner's face now he had finally fallen asleep, exhausted. He ran his eyes down the ragged scar on Danny's cheek. It must have bled so badly and hurt so much when the injury was inflicted on him during those dark, dark months. It had never been cared for, never been stitched. He needed to make everything right for Danny, that was all that mattered. Doing just that had seemed like an almost insurmountable task, but now... something was different. Something had changed.

Steve had been so, so worried when Danny crashed so hard after making the ID's. Danny had started to shake uncontrollably. He couldn't seem to stop staring at that last photo, at the face of one of the men who had hurt him so badly. Steve had gently plucked his cell from Danny's trembling hand and had lifted him over to the bed, laid him down carefully. Danny had curled up, panting hard and counting harder and Steve had truly wished he had never let him lay eyes on those bastards again.

But, for some reason, Danny hadn't fully withdrawn into himself and when he had finally calmed down, when he had looked up at Steve and for reasons unknown had whispered his thanks, there had been something new about him. Something that Steve wanted to say reminded him of the old Danny but he didn't quite dare to. That wasn't fair at all. But the fear that had been ever-present in his partner's eyes when he had looked at Steve before… Steve just couldn't see it. He still saw trust, even after the revelations which must have turned Danny's world upside-down, and rightly or wrongly that mattered to Steve beyond anything else. But, more than that, there had been an edge of determination about Danny that filled Steve with hope.

Steve was still counting for him, hoping it would help Danny find peace as he slept. He would count until he woke again, he wasn't going to leave his side. No way. He had phoned Joe, passed on the intel. Now his job was to keep Danny's demons at bay, to protect him from his nightmares.

But the room was spinning again. A tremor ran through his body and his hand slipped away from Danny's. He tried to lift it again, he needed to rub Danny's scars for him. His hand wouldn't co-operate. The tremors were building. He just couldn't fucking stop them. The room was too hot. No, he was too hot. The sweat poured off him. The nausea, the headache, the shakiness… they were all building. Shit. He had to keep counting for Danny.

He tried to shift position in the vain hope that might somehow help but his legs turned to jelly and he slid off the bed, landed on his knees. Everything around him suddenly seemed hazy and vague.

He had to keep counting. The numbers were still coming out but his voice was slurring and he didn't know if it was good enough. He gritted his teeth, face twisting with frustration and fury at his own weakness, at his own stupidity for inflicting this on himself to begin with. Danny needed him and he was letting him down.

The door opened. Steve looked up through blurred vision. He saw a white coat. One of Danny's doctors. He knew then, this was it. It was time.

"P-please. I need help," he slurred.

TBC

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