Disclaimer: I don't own Human Target and intend no copyright infringement.
"I really don't need to tell you anything about anatomy, do I? In your field of profession knowing where the smallest impact would lead to the greatest damage is probably regarded as basic…."
"Ex-profession", Chance grumbled. He had known Dr. Grace would give him an earful, but boy, was she on a roll tonight.
"So I guess I don't need to tell you that in 90% of the cases a dislocated shoulder leads to a Bankart lesion, especially when it's put back in the field and not in a hospital, under the watchful eyes of trained personnel, after getting a proper x-ray."
A mischievous smile flitted across Chance's face and Grace smacked him with her stethoscope. "Don't you dare say something along the lines of If you want to see me shirtless, all you have to do is ask."
"Ouch! Isn't hurting the patient on purpose against the Hippocratic oath or something?"
"Chance, for heaven's sake, this is serious. I should have seen this prior to the repositioning, to determine if there was any nerve or blood vessel damage. And the x-rays would have been important to make sure there weren't any fractures around the joint." Grace angrily stomped off to the far end of the room.
"But there weren't any, were there?" Putting on his most innocent puppy face and yes, admiring Dr. Grace's well-shaped rear just a little – hey, his shoulder and leg were hurt, other parts of him were perfectly intact – Chance watched her rummaging around in one of her cabinets.
"Guerrero was lucky! And you were, too!" Apparently Grace had found what she was looking for. She retrieved something from the cabinet, stuffed it in the pocket of her coat and walked back to Chance. "But of course, instead of being grateful that you got off the hook so easily with the dislocated shoulder and resting a little, you had nothing better to do than jump right into your next kamikaze operation. That badly healed gash along your leg, it was caused by animal teeth, wasn't it?"
Chance shifted uncomfortably on the surgery couch. Grace was one of the very few women that seemed to be more or less immune to his lopsided smile.
"Tiger? Shark? Chimpanzee?"
"Chimpanzee?", Chance scoffed.
"Just because Tarzan had a Cheeta to cuddle with when Jane was too busy doesn't mean those teeth are meant for show. Don't mess with a Chimpanzee, they fight dirty."
Now Chance's smile was real, not simply meant to manipulate. "I'll keep it in mind."
When she kept staring at him, he sighed. "It was a crocodile."
Shaking her head, she pulled out of her pocket what she had retrieved from her cabinet a moment ago. It was a piece of thick white rope.
"This here, Chance, is your supraspinatus muscle. The way it should be, perfectly intact. The supraspinatus might look small in comparison to others, but it is the main agonist muscle for the abduction of the arm at the shoulder joint during the first 10-15 degrees of its arc. It counters the gravitational forces of the downward pull caused by the weight of the upper limb and stabilizes the shoulder joint in general. The supraspinatus is small but incredibly important. Think of it as the Guerrero of the muscle world."
Noticing Chance's eyes turning glassy, Grace reached for a rather large scalpel laid out on one of the sideboards."What you have done to it while fleeing from the crocodile, I guess, is this…" Without warning she started slashing at the piece of rope till it was kept together by one thin thread alone.
"This is your supraspinatus right now. Hanging on for dear life. A feeling you should be able to relate to."
Chance snorted. "Thanks for the visual, doc."
"I'm not getting through to you, am I?"
"I'll spent a day or two on the couch, promise."
"A day or two won't do, Chance. Those marks on your face, they stem from a recent car accident, don't they? Let me guess, you didn't bother to have your head checked for a concussion, right?" She put the rope away. "Your body needs rest. Extensive, long term rest for at least two weeks. No jumping out of high rises, planes, moving cars. No mano-a-mano fist fight with any given number of thugs. No explosions. No poisoning."
"I'll do my best."
"I couldn't care less, but you're seriously risking your life here, Chance."
"Thanks for worrying." Chance hopped off the surgery couch and proceeded to put on his jacket.
"I'm not worrying."
Grinning, he exited the treatment room. Dr. Grace, however, kept staring at the empty spot on the couch long after he was gone. Finally she pulled herself together, went to her desk, activated her phone and dialed a number she hated to use.
"Guerrero? This is Grace. We need to talk."
… … …
When Chance came back to the warehouse it was, to his utter surprise, not deserted, as he had expected. Ames was sitting at the kitchen table, sipping at a cup of coffee.
"How are you?", she asked him, noticing very well how gingerly he sat down on the chair opposite from her.
"Glad to be home."
"I can relate to that", she replied, eyes resting on her coffee.
When the silence between them started stretching and Chance apparently wasn't going to ask why she was here and not hanging out with Ken or whatever, she rolled her eyes and sighed. "Ken's having a cookout with a couple of friends. Sounded like fun, but I still have some stuff here, didn't want it to be lying about any longer…"
The silence started stretching again. Ames was just about to throw her empty cup at Chance and somehow force him to talk to her when he finally – finally! – spoke up.
"I'm starving. What about pizza? It's on me."
Ames resisted the urge to bury her face in her hands.
"Pizza would be fine", she mumbled.