The Ambulance Doctor Left Speechless
Director Simon Vance had no earthly idea why Avery Hayes needed to rip Dylan Nash's shirt open to save him, but since she was the only one not panicking, he had no choice but to trust her.
In a matter of seconds, Dylan's shirt was off, and his pupils had started to dilate.
It was terrifyingly obvious he was struggling for every single breath.
Avery clutched the empty syringe, her eyes locked on his chest.
She took a deep, steadying breath, forcing herself to be calm, and pulled a memory to the front of her mind.
Finding the exact spot on his chest just below the collarbone, she confirmed the position with her fingertips.
Her amber eyes sharpened. Holding her own breath, she put firm, steady pressure on the plunger and drove the needle into the space between his ribs.
A sharp hiss of air immediately escaped the puncture site. It was the trapped air that had been crushing Dylan's lungs, the same air that was about to send him into shock. A moment later, Dylan himself let out a long, choked gasp, his own breath finally breaking free.
The second the syringe went in, the entire set had fallen silent. Every single person was frozen, their eyes glued to Avery. It was only when the awful purple tint began to fade from Dylan's face that a collective, shaky sigh of relief rippled through the crew.
They stared at her in a new kind of awe. *Damn, she didn't even hesitate,* someone thought. If you didn't know she was saving his life, you'd think she was trying to kill him. The quiet on set was absolute; no one dared to even breathe too loud.
Now that the crisis was over, the adrenaline started to crash.
Avery's knuckles were white from how tightly she'd been gripping the syringe, and she suddenly realized her back was drenched in a cold sweat.
She wasn't the real Avery, the one who'd aced medical school.
She'd inherited the knowledge of what was wrong with Dylan and how to fix it, but this was the first time *she* had ever personally jammed a sharp object into a living person's chest.
The only reason she'd pulled it off so smoothly was thanks to the countless hours of simulations the original Dr. Hayes had logged in her memories.
"Okay, did someone call an ambulance?" Avery asked, her voice calm and crisp as she held the syringe steady. "Any idea when they'll be here?" If you listened closely, though, you could hear the slight tremor at the end of her words.
"Right, the hospital's close by. They shouldn't be long," screenwriter Jude Finch piped up from the side, craning his neck to get a better look at Dylan's chest. He wasn't the only one. The crew started to crowd in, their eyes wide with morbid curiosity.
"My god," someone whispered. "This is more intense than anything we film."
*How did a guest actress pull that off? Saved him with just a syringe.*
*But man, that's a lot of blood, isn't it?*
Speaking of blood, Jude cringed when he saw Avery's costume. The pristine white fabric was now stained crimson. *Oh no, the costume is ruined. I wonder if they can get that clean for this afternoon's shoot.*
"With all that blood, isn't he going to bleed out?" Simon asked, his voice tight with nerves as he watched more blood well up from the puncture wound.
Avery didn't take her eyes off Dylan. "He won't. It just looks like a lot. I missed the major blood vessels."
Simon's brow furrowed. "So what exactly happened to him? How does a fall make him stop breathing?"
"Tension pneumothorax," she said, her explanation clinical and clipped.
"A lung ruptured. I've stabilized him, but he needs to get to a hospital for a full workup. If the tear is small, it might heal on its own. If it's large, he'll need surgery."
She flicked a quick glance at the director before her focus returned to Dylan, watching for any complications.
Twenty minutes later, the ambulance finally arrived.
Paramedics rushed onto the set with a stretcher. When they saw Avery crouched over Dylan, an empty syringe still sticking out of his chest, their expressions darkened.
"Tension pneumothorax?" the lead doctor, a man in his forties, asked, his tone immediately accusatory.
"This is reckless! You can't just perform a field procedure like this on a whim! One wrong move and the patient could die from blood loss."
He hadn't even assessed the situation before starting his lecture.
Avery looked up at him, her gaze sharp and cold. "And if I hadn't done something, do you think he'd still be breathing by the time you got here?"
*Does this guy just like the sound of his own voice?* she thought. A tension pneumothorax was a critical emergency. The window to act was maybe three to five minutes, tops.
The doctor's mouth opened, then closed. He was speechless. After a beat, he muttered stubbornly, "You'd better hope he doesn't have a massive bleed, or, "
"As a doctor, judging blood loss is a basic skill," Avery cut him off. "If he'd been bleeding out this whole time, do you really think the scene would look like this?"
Her words hung in the air, and the set fell silent once again.
Everyone stared, stunned by her takedown.
No one had expected this guest actress to talk back to a doctor, let alone shut him down so completely.
But then they remembered her background, and it suddenly made sense.
Her medical skills were obviously the real deal, way more solid than the guy who'd just shown up.
Done with the argument, Avery turned to the nurse with the stretcher. "Please, hurry and get him to the hospital."
The nurse, still reeling from watching her own doctor get schooled, just mumbled an, "Oh," and moved forward. She carefully stabilized the syringe while the crew helped lift Dylan onto the stretcher. The ambulance doctor, thoroughly put in his place, didn't say another word as they left.
Even with an accident, the shoot had to go on. Simon sent his assistant to the hospital to check on Dylan, while Jude found the head of wardrobe, his expression pained as he pointed at Avery's blood-stained costume.
"Hey, can you get Dr. Hayes's outfit cleaned up right away? We need it by two p.m." Then he turned to Avery. "Please, go change. You can put it back on after it's been cleaned."
Avery just nodded and headed for the dressing room.
At noon, Simon took Avery out to lunch as a thank you. He insisted on adding her on Messenger and promised that if any of his future projects had a role that fit her, she'd be the first person he'd call.
Avery didn't play coy. She raised her teacup and accepted gracefully. "Then I appreciate you looking out for me, Director."
Hearing that, Simon realized she was serious about making a career in this business. His tone shifted, becoming more serious, more like a mentor. "Have you signed with an agency? I could introduce you to a few good ones. In this industry, it's safer to have a professional team behind you."
An introduction from Simon Vance was a golden ticket. He had deep connections, and his recommendation would let her skip the years of grinding it out that most newcomers faced. It was an opportunity most people could only dream of.
But it was no surprise he was laying it on so thick.
Earlier, he had googled "tension pneumothorax" on his phone. The results made him break out in a cold sweat. If Avery hadn't been on set today, Dylan would almost certainly be dead.
And she hadn't just saved Dylan's life. She'd saved the entire production of *The World's Game*.
Everyone knew that a major safety incident could kill a project on the spot.
And for a flagship show with a budget of nearly forty-five million dollars, a failure like that would have been the end of his career.