Steve's eyes were closed; his trembling hands hovered over Danny's body. He couldn't bring himself to look down or touch his friend.

He had failed.

Despite the terrible dreams he'd had, despite the fact that he had known what would happen, despite all his efforts to protect his partner he had failed.

He had failed and now Danny was dead.

Steve drew in a deep shuddering breath when the gravity of the situation hit him full force. He felt like a huge boulder had crushed down on him, pressing heavily against his chest and shattering his heart into tiny pieces.

What would his team say? How could he live on with his guilt? What would he tell Grace?

Oh God, Gracie… the little girl would have to live without her father and Danny would never see his beloved daughter growing up.

McGarrett noticed two set of steps behind him but he didn't dare to open his eyes and look at his teammates. He had failed them too, he…

"I'll call an ambulance."

Kono's voice interrupted his gloomy thoughts and only a moment later he could hear the soft familiar beeping of a cell phone and then Kono's request for medical help.

"It's too late," Steve whispered hoarsely, but his words were so quiet that nobody seemed to hear them. "It's too late… it's my fault, he's…"

But once again he was interrupted, this time by a sudden strangled, pained gasp.

Steve's eyes snapped open and for the first time since the dreadful gunshots had rung through the afternoon heat and he'd seen Danny fall he really looked at his partner and what he saw made his heart skip a beat.

He had been so sure that his dream had come true; he had been convinced that Danny was dead. Gazing down at his friend he noticed in amazement that Danny's blue eyes didn't stare lifelessly into the bright sky but instead they were squeezed shut, the pale face contorted with pain when he struggled to draw a proper breath.

McGarrett didn't know how long he just stared, without blinking, without breathing, not really believing what he saw. It could have been an eternity but in reality it was only a second and when Danny struggled for the next breath Steve finally leaped into action.

"Can't… breathe…" Danny wheezed in agony, his right hand erratically moving across his Kevlar vest in a desperate attempt to open it up while his left arm lay motionless at his side, blood from a gunshot wound in the shoulder slowly soaking the ground. His eyes flew open and he blinked rapidly against the sudden brightness, his panicked gaze unsteadily darting around.

"Stay still, I've got it," Steve said, forcefully shoving his emotions to the back of his mind as he grabbed Danny's right hand while he quickly loosened the fasteners of the vest with his free hand. Tightening his grip around Danny's wrist he tried to get Danny's attention and lock eyes with his partner. "I've got it; you're gonna be alright, Danny. I've got it," he murmured repeatedly as he yanked open the vest.

Steve allowed himself a tiny sigh of relief when he watched Danny finally take a few proper breaths – his partner really was alive and now all he had to do was to make sure that he stayed alive. He turned his attention to the gunshot wound in the shoulder but it looked like a clean through-and-through and the bleeding already seemed to be slowing down. There was another pool of blood beneath Danny's head but on closer examination it turned out to be just a laceration at the back of his head, probably from his fall to the ground.

Keeping his fingers locked around Danny's wrist, Steve placed his other hand lightly on Danny's chest to provide as much support as possible until the ambulance arrived only a short time later. Danny's breathing had become a bit less laborious once the vest had been gone but every breath of air ended in a soft moan; his face was pale, covered with a thin layer of sweat and contorted with pain. He blinked sluggishly as if he had trouble keeping his eyes open but when the two paramedics forced Steve to step back and give them space to work, Danny slightly turned his head and kept eye contact with his partner.

Danny kept the eye contact even as one of the paramedics placed an oxygen mask over his mouth and nose and until he was placed on a gurney and moved into the waiting ambulance. The paramedics worked quickly and effectively and after three or four minutes of busy activity they closed the doors and hurtled off, leaving a baffled and speechless Steve behind.

McGarrett stared numbly after the ambulance until the wailing of the sirens had faded away, then he slowly blinked a few times and fought back the rising nausea. He staggered back a few steps and suddenly his legs didn't support his weight anymore and he crouched down in an ungraceful movement. Rocking back onto his heels, he swallowed dryly, trying to grasp the latest events. A cold shiver ran down his spine when his gaze fell on the blood-soaked ground in front of him and he squeezed his eyes shut when once more his emotions bubbled to the surface.

He didn't know how much time had passed when he felt a touch on his shoulder and Kono's soft voice reached his ears, "Hey boss, you alright?"

Hesitating for a long moment, Steve thought about the question. Was he alright? He'd had these terrible dreams of Danny dying in front of his eyes and for a few agonizingly long minutes he had been convinced that his nightmares had come true, he had been convinced that Danny had been gone forever. But his friend was alive, his injuries didn't seem to be life-threatening, and with proper treatment and a few days in the hospital he would hopefully be alright.

Danny hadn't died, he would be alright – that sudden realization exploded in Steve's mind like a firework and he finally nodded once.

"I'm good," he whispered hoarsely, a tentative smile slowly creeping across his face. "I'm good."

"Would you finally stop staring at me as if I'm Santa Claus who's bringing you some huge Christmas presents," Danny huffed out, shaking his head in annoyance when he saw his partner grinning brightly at him. He leaned back in the passenger's seat of his silver Camaro and watched Steve curiously out of narrowed eyes.

After five days in the hospital Danny had finally been released, the gunshot wound in the shoulder indeed a clean through-and-through which miraculously didn't do any serious damage to nerves or bones. It would hurt for quite a while but after a few hours of physical therapy Danny would regain full function of his arm. He'd also sustained a minor concussion and a nasty laceration at the back of his head from his fall to the ground after the second gunshot had hit him full force center mass. Luckily the Kevlar vest had prevented that bullet from entering his body but the result of the impact had been a spectacular bruising on the right side of Danny's chest, a cracked rib and a slight contusion of his lung.

Turning his whole body a little bit to the left to have a better look at his friend, Danny tried to figure out what was going on inside Steve's head. During the last few days Steve had barely left his side, a constant presence by his hospital bed, and most of the time a huge grin had colored his features. But behind the genuine delight that Danny was alive there had been something else, a strange glint in Steve's eyes that Danny wasn't able to decipher at first.

But the longer he mulled over the events just before the bullets had hit him and over Steve's odd behavior in the days before the shoot-out, he finally came to the one logical realization and his eyes suddenly grew wide at that thought.

"How did you know?" Danny asked quietly, noticing in surprise that Steve tensed in his seat and his knuckles turned white when his fingers gripped the steering wheel more tightly.

"How did I know what?" the Ex-SEAL replied after a pause that was just a little bit too long, struggling hard to keep his voice level and free of emotions.

Rolling his eyes about Steve's clumsy try to avoid a proper answer, Danny heaved a deep sigh when he saw the tight-lipped expression on Steve's face. His cracked rib protested against the heedless movement and Danny was barely able to keep a pained groan at bay. Pressing his right arm against his ribcage he gritted his teeth and took a few shallow breaths until the wave of pain passed by. Rephrasing his previous question, Danny tried to clarify his statement when he said, "You knew what would happen at that wrecking yard, right? You knew that I would be shot. The question is how you knew all that, Steven."

"I don't know what you're talking about," McGarrett finally replied hoarsely after another period of silence, throwing his partner a brief look before he returned his attention to the traffic.

Over the last few days Steve had tried more than once to tell Danny about his dreams but every time he had opened his mouth something deep inside him had strived against it. At first he had thought it was out of fear that Danny wouldn't believe him, that he would think his partner had gone crazy. Steve briefly smiled at that thought, because in the course of their partnership Danny had already told him more than once that in his eyes Steve was totally and completely nuts, so that fear was clearly unfounded.

No, it was not out of fear that Danny wouldn't believe him, it was something else, something deeper. Those dreams were definitely something special and wherever they had come from, Steve was immensely grateful for them. They might have been pretty disturbing and nerve-racking and Steve was sure that they had cost him at least five years of his life and had given him some more gray hair but he would gladly endure a lot more than that if he was able to save his partner's life.

All those hours he had spent in Danny's hospital room and watched him recover from his injuries Steve had thought about those dreams. He wasn't deeply religious, never had been, and after all the atrocities he had seen during his military days he had lost even more of his faith in God. But having grown up in Hawaii where a lot of people still kept to the old traditions and the faith in deities and spirits was very common, he accepted without doubt or hesitation that there might be something more, some higher power or whatever one wanted to call it.

And somehow he had the strange feeling that if he told Danny – or anyone else – about his dreams that he would betray that higher power. Steve couldn't really explain where the feeling came from; he just felt that these dreams had been just for him alone so that he was able to save his friend.

"Steve?" Danny interrupted his musings, his voice in equal shares annoyed and amused. "Steven? Hello? Earth to Navy SEAL... are you with me? Is there any chance you're ever gonna answer my question?"

Slightly shaking his head to clear his whirling thoughts, Steve took a deep breath and noticed astonished that they had already reached their goal. Swiftly parking the car in front of Danny's apartment he shut off the engine and for a few moments he just sat there and stared out the windscreen, clearly feeling Danny's eyes curiously resting on him.

"Listen, Danny," McGarrett finally breathed out as he turned his head to look at his partner. "I…" He interrupted himself and cleared his throat, not really knowing how he could explain what had happened. He slightly raised his hands in a small gesture of insecurity before they dropped back onto the steering wheel. "I… I just knew, okay?"

Narrowing his eyes when he heard the sincerity in Steve's voice Danny hesitated for a moment and swallowed down the witty comment he'd had on the tip of his tongue. Not really able to read the expression on Steve's face he asked hesitantly, "So, you had some kind of premonition or what? I didn't know that you believe in the supernatural…" Danny's voice trailed off and a nervous little giggle left his throat while his eyes still searched Steve's face for any hint of what was going on.

Remaining silent for another long moment Steve finally sighed deeply before he said quietly, "I believe there are things we don't understand in this world but that doesn't mean they don't exist." He slightly shrugged his shoulders and locked eyes with his best friend. "Why don't we just leave it alone and enjoy the fact that you're alive?"

Staring at each other for what seemed to be an eternity the two friends sat in the car in total silence until Danny finally blinked once and nodded his head.

"I think I can live with that," he agreed, a bright smile slowly creeping across his face. He put out his right hand and added solemnly, "And thanks for saving my life, babe."

Shifting his gaze from Danny's face to his outstretched hand and back to his face, Steve also began to smile but instead of grabbing Danny's hand he leaned over to the right and pulled Danny in an awkward hug.

"Anytime, Danno," he whispered, his smile growing even bigger when he felt Danny return the hug after a second of hesitation. "Anytime."

THE END

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