Disclaimer: I don't own H50. Just having some fun.
The trouble with trauma was sometimes you did remember, even if you didn't want to, even if you couldn't begin to process it. And Danny Williams remembered. Most of it anyway. The stuff that was sure to give him nightmares for months, if not longer.
He straightened himself and closed his eyes, running his fingers across his scalp. When he had a monster headache like this one, he could feel his hair. Scratching his head always helped. But not so much this time. He could feel it all, every strand of his blonde hair and every cut on his fingertips. An odd sort of mingling of pleasure and pain.
He studied himself for a moment. Broken fingers, sprained wrist, sliced fingertips, torn nails, sore knuckles. It hurt to flex either hand. He sucked in a deep breath and let himself come back to the present. He hoped he could relay what he remembered without occupying that terrifying moment again. He certainly didn't want to get stuck there.
Danny knew he could let go of some of the weight. Offer it up on the altar of friendship, a sacred gift of shared pain. So he began with a sigh.
"I made some popcorn. Had a stack of DVDs. My new TV."
"Yea, your TV – bad news there, Danno."
Danny nodded. "First thing they broke. Besides me." He rubbed the spot on the back of his head.
Steve leaned against the wall. He held back his need to coach his friend, to help him along. He could barely look at Danny, yet he just could not take his eyes off of him either. He still wasn't sure if he was real. He had his own nightmares to conquer. The sight of his partner lying in that metal box kept popping into his mind at random moments.
Danny closed his eyes. "I came to in there." He motioned toward the kitchen, chair still overturned with bits of silver tape on one of the legs. "My arms were bound behind my back, guns pointed at my face."
"Did you recognize anybody?"
"No, they wore masks. Seemed like hired muscle." His voice drifted off for a few seconds. Then he went on with a little more strength. "Then the big guy showed up."
"Big guy?"
"The boss. Sounded Russian or Eastern European maybe. Asked me alotta questions."
"What questions? Do you remember?"
"Nah, I kinda zoned out. He smacked me around for a while. I didn't know anything. Wouldn't have answered if I did. And my smart mouth –"
"Got you a fucked up wrist."
"And two fingers." Danny waved the two taped appendages. "That's what really woke me up. Didn't see it coming."
"I bet. Since your hands were behind your back." Steve wasn't sure what came over him but those words popped out anyway.
"See, I don't like your tone." Danny straightened himself, wounded hand in his lap while the other motioned toward his partner. "Of course I couldn't see my hands tied behind my back. If I was Superman maybe I could have avoided this altogether."
Steve held his hand up. "I didn't mean."
"I know. That's not what I meant either. I just can't believe they got the drop on me." Danny shook his head, and when he spoke again, his voice was softer, more distant. "Maybe I'm just not ready to process this. I don't know what I'm doing. I can't focus. My head feels like a bomb went off."
Steve wasn't ready to drop the conversation even though he knew it might hurt his partner to keep going. So he tossed out the next thing that came to mind.
"Danny, do you think your nephew-" Steve didn't finish his question. Just left it hanging.
Danny rubbed his forehead. "Frankly, I don't know. With the masks and all. And not everyone opened their mouths. If he was there, I bet they made him watch."
He groaned and ruffled his hair again. "I don't know, Steve. God – I just don't."
Neither man spoke for a few minutes. Danny slouched back into the couch, eyes closed. Steve watched him carefully.
"I'm not falling asleep, ya know. So please stop looking at me like that. I know I have a concussion. If there's anything left up there to knock around." Danny opened one eye. He sat up again and continued. "I don't remember much after they twisted my hand all to hell. I woke up in that box."
His next breath hitched in his throat. Steve fought the urge to reach out to Danny, to comfort him in some way. Instead he gave his friend space to continue on his own, if he could.
"I didn't know if I'd get out. Your power of positive thinking lasted about two seconds." Danny wiped his eyes, not even trying to hide the tears.
Steve smiled. "You're new to the game."
"Yea. Something like that." Nodding, Danny made an attempt to smile but winced instead. "I don't remember much of it."
"Didn't think you would, D."
"What's that supposed to mean?" Danny threw up his hands. "That I'm not super human like you? My powers of perception aren't as developed or something? Oh and to top it all off I have feelings?"
Steve stopped him from ranting more. "Nah man, it's nothing like that. You know how the brain sometimes protects you by forgetting trauma. Come on. It's just knowing what I know about you. This must have been crazy hard."
"Crazy hard? What is that? Seal speak for terrifying? Or have you turned into a 9 year old girl?" Danny held his wounded hand against his chest. "Crazy hard? Seriously?"
"What I meant was." Steve knew he might be pushing too hard now. Maybe he should stop talking altogether, and they could just sit there in silence. But he couldn't shut up. "Dammit Danny, of course it was hard for you. What do you want me to say?"
"Someone who isn't afraid of anything doesn't have the right to open his mouth about this."
"Who says I'm not afraid of anything?"
"Yea right. Big tough Navy Seal action figure is afraid of something."
Steve didn't respond. He just hardened his gaze. This time, Danny did feel a little bit of guilt for his harsh tone. "Look, Steve, I'm sorry. I don't know what the hell I'm saying."
"Oh so now you're apologizing to me for something. That's rich." Steve crossed his arms.
The moment had become tense a little too fast. Each of them risked wounding the other.
Danny felt like his head was expanding, but all he cared about was smoothing things out with his friend. He couldn't let his emotions get the better of him. "I mean it. I'm sorry. I'm under a lot of stress here."
"And you don't think I am too?" Steve moved closer to his friend, sitting on the coffee table, their knees almost touching. "You don't think I was terrified?"
"Terrified? I didn't think that word was in your vocabulary." Danny looked down. "And I didn't see you locked in a metal box and left to die."
"No man, but you were. You." Steve pointed at his friend, almost poking Danny in the chest. "My best friend. I can only imagine how hard that was for you. Most of all." Steve stopped, covering his mouth to hide the hitch in his breath, before letting his hand fall to his hip. "Most of all, Danno, I could have lost you today."
Danny blinked back what could have been more tears. Instead, he turned them into sarcasm. He had to diffuse the moment because it was just too much to take. "Gee babe, I did not know you felt that way about me."
Steve flopped beside Danny, thinking he'd throw his arm around his friend and give him a big goofy hug. Instead, he ended up knocking him off the couch.
Danny yelped as he instinctively braced himself. He lost his balance and crumpled to the floor, narrowly missing the coffee table. He lay there for a few seconds, not speaking.
"Danny, you okay?"
"Yea sure. I think I broke my hand."
Steve couldn't stop the burst of a chuckle.
"No babe. Again, thank you. Again." Danny flexed the fingers he could. "Check that. You did. Pushing me here. You broke my hand again."
"You know I'm sorry, man. Let me help you up." Steve knew his partner probably wanted to smack the smirk right off his face.
Danny groaned, taking in a slow breath to push back the pain. And he couldn't look Steve in the eye right then. He wasn't ready to laugh it off. Instead, he thought about the dust bunnies multiplying under the couch. He really needed to vacuum.
Then he saw it. A cell phone.
"Wait." He brushed off Steve's insistent need to help.
"It's perfectly okay with me if you want to stay down there but I don't think you want Grace to see you splayed out on the floor like that."
"Grace?" Danny pushed up from the floor. Again with the bad hand. "Ah geez."
A few indecipherable words spewed from his mouth and he was flat on his face.
Steve couldn't hide his smile. "You really are a mess. You know that, right?"
"I forgot Grace."
"No you didn't, buddy. I was just kidding. Remember, it's not your weekend. And Grace is with Rachel at the Hilton."
"Not cool. Totally not cool, using my daughter against me like that." Danny sat up, testing the waters, his head spinning from pain and a wave of dizziness. "Just for that, you, my friend, can crawl under there and grab the cell phone."
Thank you for reading. :-)