A/N: This chapter gave me problems for some reason, because there was a lot to fit in it, and yet it seems a bit ploddy to me. I thought it had a ways to go too, when all of a sudden the last paragraph happened, and that had to be where it stopped. I hope you like this, and value any constructive criticism. If you think I went off course somewhere, let me know, even if you aren't sure where.

I made up Steve's doc. He had a surgeon in the transplant scene, but Danny's was clearly Dr. Cornett, so I pulled out an OC for Steve.

Hawaii Five-0 is owned by CBS. I am harmlessly borrowing their characters. This is just for fun.

Chapter 6

Danny was feeling at peace now that so many anxieties of the past week had slipped away. He and Steve were back to being ohana, and that was the healing he needed the most. How that tall, cocky, loyal, control-freak Hawaiian-born-and-bred Navy SEAL had made it past his New Jersey emotional barriers to become his brother was beyond him.

Danny remembered all too well that their meeting was one of mutual distrust for the first few minutes, which morphed into Steve figuring out his buttons and pushing them for the joy of bugging him, and Danny letting Steve know he was not going to back down to him or let him run roughshod over him even if Steve was half a head taller and had virtually no ability to communicate anything but the most elementary of emotions. Steve had gotten Danny shot through his upper left arm during their first visit to a suspect's residence, but Danny followed through with the fact that he was Steve's partner - which was a lot more than co-worker or colleague. Partners watched each others' backs. They learned to think alike - or at least Danny had learned very quickly to figure out if there was a hair-brained, risky way to handle a situation, and a safe way, Steve would pick the former. When there were several choices of risks, any of which Steve would take, Danny had figured out which one his partner would choose, and he would back him up. The first test had been that first day, and of course Steve almost got a hostage shot, and himself, but Danny had been able to get into position despite his throbbing, bleeding arm, and shoot the perp before he shot Steve or the hostage.

As a payback, Steve had thrown a ninja move on him which, had he carried it farther, would have broken his wrist, because Danny blew up at him for not apologizing for getting him shot. Steve had put him on his knees with his arm behind him, his wrist bent very uncomfortably, until Danny had managed to get through to him that he "got it" and wanted to be let up, asked in Danny's best "do not escalate this" voice, when in fact he had been seething like a volcano before it went Kaboom! As soon as Steve had let him stand up, he had hauled off and given him the sweetest punch to the kisser he could give. He had sent Steve staggering.

Somehow or other, this led to them being trusting partners, and eventually, surprisingly quickly, to friendship.

"Has it really been six years?" Danny asked, and Steve smiled. They could read each other pretty well now. Except for when they could not. If something was bothering Steve, Danny had to play two billion questions with him to get him to open up. If Danny chose not to divulge something trivial, or not trivial, to Steve, Danny was hounded to death until he told Steve every last detail of what was on his mind. The hounding drove him as crazy as Steve's inability to think in terms of other people's feelings drove Danny crazy. They were partners, best friends, and ohana. In Hawaii. The whole situation was so improbable that Danny still had trouble wrapping his head around it.

Danny realized that Steve was pale, and looking uncomfortable, as if he were in pain. "Hey, you want me to buzz the nurse? You should lie down, buddy. You hurting?"

"Yeah. A little." He did carefully lie down on his bed, but nixed calling in the nurse. "My doc will be by soon, he's punctual."

"How strange that we have both been in this incredibly hospitable hospital neither of us wants to be in for a whole week now, and I do not even know who your doctor is. Or how you are really doing. My micro-visits from Chin and Kono...well, they never told me, and I never got the chance to ask."

"What did they tell you?"

Danny shrugged. "That you were okay, doing better, no sign of rejecting the liver, wounds healing, you were eating, were very tired and sleeping a lot. Put that on a loop tape ending with 'I have to go see how Steve is doing,' and 'we are taking shifts so he isn't alone' -while I was - and you have the content of my visits with Chin and Kono this whole week."

Steve's brows did a good job of rising upward in mirror images, at almost 45 degrees, so that his forehead turned into parallel rows of wrinkles. "Huh. That's so unlike them."

"You never almost died before, Steve."

"You never donated your liver before, Danny. And you could've died."

Danny shrugged again. "For me, it was a small risk. For you, it was a certainty. I do not think they got beyond thinking of you. I understand why I was never on the radar." He was feeling inwardly neglected again, because it had been a lonely week, but as he had said earlier, he was glad Steve was receiving so much love. That did not mean he understood how his "ohana" had let him down so badly by showing that, even with their brief and distracted visits, they were never thinking of him.

"Grover ever stop by? He's been by to see me almost every day. What about Jerry? Or Max?"

Danny kept it simple. This whole lack of visitation by his friends was a sore subject, one he did not particularly want to talk about anymore. "Grover, once, the first day, but I was sleeping. The nurses told me later, with great glee, that he told them to tell me to, quote, get my white ass well, unquote."

"That's it?"

"That's it."

"Hmm."

Danny could feel Steve getting the bit in his teeth about this, and added quickly, "But Rachel is letting Grace come stay two hours every other evening. Twice she has let Charlie come too. Grace should be by tonight. Could we not tell her about the fall? I doubt Rachel would have told her anyway."

Steve did the forty five degree eyebrows again, and looked stricken. "I'm sorry, I never got the chance to tell her! Or Chin or Kono, or anyone! They shot me full of sedatives and - "

Danny looked pensive. "You needed the sleep, and I can just imagine how they would have resented me ruining Max's going away party at Rumfire." Rumfire was one of the most popular places for a large party. The reservation had been for the Diamond Head Patio at the Sheraton Hotel. "Pulling them away from all those fancy rum drinks and delicious seafood...well, they would not have liked that. Max deserved his party." 'That I had not even been told about,' Danny added sadly in his mind. He was starting to feel depressed again, and did not want Steve to see it.

Thankfully, the conversation was interrupted by the knock on the door, and as nondescript a voice as Danny had ever heard, saying, "Good morning, gentlemen." It was Steve's doctor, and Danny read his name tag. "Dr. Walter Simmons." He had dark, straight brown hair cut short, brown eyes, wore glasses with black rims, and would have been very hard to ID from a police artist's sketch as he looked just like a Generic Human Caucasian Male. He did have a manner that radiated good will and competence. He was carrying a small laptop computer. Steve greeted him and introduced him to Danny.

"Ah, and a pleasure it is to meet the entire donor of Steve's liver! That was a brave thing you did, donating. Not enough people are willing to do that," he said, and by the time their handshake was over, Danny was starting to really hope he didn't squeeze his hand any harder.

"He's my brother," said Danny, smiling, pointing at Steve.

Doctor Simmons glanced in confusion at the information he was already calling up on his computer. "It would explain the match, but the chart fails to - "

"He's like a brother to me," Danny quickly corrected. "He's my partner. We've been together for six years. I would do anything for him."

This confused and perplexed the doctor even more. "This chart fails to give you proper listing as his legal spouse. No matter, I will have this chart updated by - "

"We're not married!" Danny and Steve said quickly, in perfect unison, right down to inflection. Danny added, tiredly, "Babe, you explain. I'm going to brush my teeth. Dr. Simmons, it has been a pleasure to meet the guy who saved my friend's life. Thank you."

Danny did a thorough job getting the medicinal furry sock feeling out of his mouth, plus everything else he needed to do to feel ready to face more of a day. He moved slowly, and his ribs were unhappy about every breath. The right side of his abdomen was freshly bruised, right to the surgical incision, and both looked and felt sore. He knew he was lucky to have gotten off so lightly, considering that fall. It could have been so very much worse. His left side showed bruises beginning to turn that strange yellowish-green color, but his ribs on that side were still objecting to having to expand and contract with breathing. Danny sighed and shoved away the pain, as breathing was a non-negotiable necessity, and his ribs would have to deal with it, while he dealt with the discomfort.

As he returned to his bed, he was respectful of the pulled privacy curtain, but listened to what was being said, since it was the first chance he had really gotten to find out how Steve was healing. He learned that Steve had lost a short length of his small intestine as well as his liver and gall bladder, and was on an antibiotic to treat a minor infection the doctor did not want to turn into a major one. The bullet wound in his shoulder had nearly damaged the bone, but had stopped millimeters short. "I am surprised you can already move your arm as well as you can," said Dr. Simmons.

Danny listened as they went over any problems with the new diet, and Steve admitted he was having trouble with the restrictions. "I crave fats now. I never craved fats before."

"A common side effect of the removal of the gall bladder. But it is very important that you follow the restrictions on your intake of fats."

"And I crave waffles with boysenberry syrup. I don't even know what a boysenberry is. Danny does - he loves boysenberry syrup on waffles."

Danny grinned while the doctor explained that patients who received a transplanted organ often picked up some of the food preferences of the donor. "Be glad it was not a kidney. Patients often have their hair change color and texture to match that of their donor."

"What's wrong with the color of my hair?" asked Danny, teasing.

Steve answered back, "I am not a blond. I would not look like me if I was blond. You are the blond."

Danny chuckled.

Soon afterwards, the doctor left, after stating his pleasure that Steve was healing so well, and promising to check on him again that evening.

After the curtain was pulled back, the nurse came by with their morning medicines, and Danny got a look at the many pills Steve was now required to take. "Wow," he commented, and Steve pointed out three specific pills. "Anti-rejection meds. The dose will go down in a few months, when they are sure my body likes having your liver. So far it does."

"What's this about a fever? Infection?"

"I was told after the surgery," began Steve, swallowing his pills with a cup of water, "that I am lucky. They had to clean me up inside pretty good, because of the intestinal damage. That is almost a guarantee of infection, but thanks to my new working half a liver, I am fighting it off well."

Soon after that, breakfast arrived, and while it was not anything to get excited about, it was food, and Danny ate it. He could have eaten more, but he too was on restrictions as to amount and content. Frequent, small meals were the order until their livers had acclimated to the new normal. Within a month or slightly less, they would be full sized again, and then recovery would be even quicker.

Both were sleepy and took advantage of their fresh dose of pain medication to doze after their trays had been collected.

It was during that time that the rest of the Five-0 Task Force decided to pay Steve a visit en masse. They snuck past Danny who was resting rather than actually sleeping, and as they entered the room, they stopped by Danny's bed, briefly, before moving on to gather around Steve's. Danny was about to "wake up" and say hi when Kono whispered, "It's a good thing Danny's asleep. We can surprise Steve now. Visiting will be more awkward now that they're sharing a room."

Danny's mood plummeted, but he managed to keep feigning sleep.

Until Danny heard Steve stir and say, very clearly, "Awkward in what way? I would really like to know why this week you have almost completely ignored the friend you call ohana, the man who saved my life, who risked his own life to do that."