So… I've started watching Chicago Med… No surprises there…
And… Again, no surprises… I figured that I would start torturing their characters…
And well… Dr. Rhodes…
Dr. Rhodes will be one of my puppets from now on…
Riyadh, November 2013.
His heart was pounding in his chest. Adrenaline was blazing through his veins… His shoulder was on fire and he had his left hand well inside the chest of a kid, no older than 15… His hold on one of the kid's veins was all that kept the young boy from bleeding out. He couldn't let go…
He crouched down low over the unconscious boy, hoping that it was low enough not to catch another bullet or another piece of flying debris.
Shrapnel was flying through the air as bombs went off all around him. And some maniac somewhere was firing an assault rifle… Most likely there were many maniacs firing lots of assault rifles… He was in a war-zone for crying out loud…
He glanced towards his right shoulder. Blood… The front of his bulletproof west was smothered with red liquid…
'Turns out… The bullet needs to hit the west for the west to be of any use…'
His mind was rambling…
He shouldn't be making inside jokes with himself, he should save the kid… Then he should do something about the wound in his own shoulder…
He started getting light-headed.
'God, if you're out there… Please don't let me pass out just yet… I need to stay alert until someone can take care of this kid for me…'
The whipping sound of a bullet seemed to pass by right beside his head, so he flattened himself even more. Careful to keep the boy's vein pinched between his fingers.
His whole right side felt like it was about to fall apart, felt like his arm was just about to fall off… Was this what all the GSW patients felt like? Poor souls…
He let a scream rip from his throat as his shoulder seemed to seize up on him. During his time in Saudi Arabia, he had seen many horrible things… Things that gave him nightmares on a regular basis…
He mostly worked out of the hospital, but when the ambulances were in need of doctors… He volunteered…
'Never volunteer for anything!' for the life of him, he could not remember whom had told him that… But it might have been a pretty good advice, in hindsight…
He could feel how the kid's heart beat slow and weak against the fingers of his left hand. The kid would probably die anyway… There was no way he could survive that hole in his chest…
But Connor kept his thumb and index-finger pressed against each other, cutting off the blood-flow… He had to at least try to save the kid…
His chin dropped, jerking at his injured shoulder… He let out another painful scream, tears had started falling from his eyes by the gallon. His shoulder hurt so much! There was no end to it!
He heard sirens far away… Too bad it wasn't coming for them…
CM
He woke up in the ambulance on his way back to the hospital. The first thing he noticed was pain. All consuming pain… Pain he had never felt before…
It took him a couple of attempts to open his eyes, a task so simple had never before been so hard…
"Dr. Rhodes, you've been hit… We're taking you back to the hospital now…" a man with a thick Australian accent spoke above him. Dr. Irwin…
Oddly enough not related to the Crocodile Man... Or Crocodile Hunter… You know… Steve Irwin…
He heard himself let out a painful moan, his shoulder was bothering him more by the minute.
"The kid?" his voice was raw, and his tongue felt like sandpaper.
"Thanks to you… He might make it…" Irwin understood what he had meant, "But you should be looking out for yourself a bit more… We don't want a doctor's funeral, mate…"
In his haze of agony, he went to give a thumb up. Which he in his state didn't plan good enough, and another flare of pain shot through his right side, causing him to black out once again.
CM
When he finally woke up a couple of days later, he had IV tubes stuck to him and a heart monitor was beeping steadily by his side.
His right side hurt, but not nearly as bad as he thought he remembered. Maybe they had put him on a morphine drip? Yeah… That was probably it…
His right arm was cradled in a sling. One of those universal blue ones, found absolutely EVERYWHERE on the planet. He looked at it drunkenly, trying to figure out how messed up his arm and shoulder probably was… He had seen soldiers and civilians alike rushing through the hospital, GSWs, some could go back to whatever they usually did after a short month… Others were crippled for life…
He felt tears press on again… This time not because of pain, but because of the sudden uncertainty of his future…
Sure, he could sell his soul and work with his dad… But that was the last thing he wanted! Hell! Getting shot again was higher up on that list!
"Look who's awake!" a nurse named Jenny Hansen smiled at him. "How are you feeling, hun?"
He almost laughed… He started, but the pain in his shoulder area was too much…
"Alive…" he said, as he tried to get over the worst of the pain. "Yeah… Definitely alive…"
"The pain-med's doing their thing?" green eyes locked on his.
"Sure a lot less painful than back at the site…" he scratched the back of his head with his good hand. "How long was I out for?"
"Three days… It's Monday…"
Connor winced at the fact that he'd been out for that long, must have been some injury…? Yeah… He had been shot, but he had managed to stay awake long enough to…
"The kid?" he looked up at her, she looked back down at him with a confused expression.
"The kid… The one with the chest wound… The one I was trying to save when they found me…?"
Realization seemed to dawn on Jenny as she stepped a little closer. Her face breaking into a soft smile.
"He made it. He's already awake…"
CM
Chicago, December 2015
Connor Rhodes was brutally forced awake once again. His heart was hammering in his chest, sweat was pouring from him and he was sure he could taste blood.
Vivid images of grenades going off and bullets hitting innocent people were dancing around in his brain. Another nightmare unfolding, stealing his sleep…
He winced as his shoulder stabbed with familiar pain… It was going to snow soon…
He sat up, panting as the images faded and his surroundings got clearer and clearer.
Too shaken to go back to sleep for another hour, he grabbed a hold of his right arm and pressed himself to his feet… Today was not gonna be a fun day, judging by the pain radiating from his shoulder.
He shuffled over to his dresser, rummaged through the bottom drawer with his left hand and pulled out a sling.
He knew it would probably come as a shock to most of his colleagues. Sharon Goodwin, the chief of services knew, and she had agreed to not tell the other doctors about it, and to work something out if it was needed... And April had seen his scar, but she hadn't asked about it…
The only two people that knew anything about his shoulder was Sharon Goodwin, the chief of services, and April Sexton. Sharon had agreed to hire him, and not tell the rest of the staff about his little handicap unless the situation called for it. And April must have seen his scar, even though she didn't mention anything as she helped him stitch his arm back up…
He put the sling on, then he gently lifted his right arm inside it. Another lightning-bolt struck his shoulder before the arm was secured.
Boy, would he be a joke today? A trauma surgery fellow with one arm tied behind his back, so to speak…
He padded over to the bathroom, found the orange cylinder containing Vicodin and shook one pill into his palm. He usually managed without the meds, but today was going to be particularly rough…
Okay… So I know there might not be that much Chicago Med fanfic out here yet… And I don't know if it will ever catch on… It's not all shows that fit fanfiction…
But I'm giving this one a try… Hope you liked it…
And as always… I'm willing to make any story longer, as far as there is enough interest...