Sprain

"Hey Frank," Dick called as Frank entered the gym. Frank looked around, but he couldn't see where Dick was. "Up here." Frank looked up to see Dick balancing on one hand in the rafters.

"Hi Dick," Frank replied. "Should you be doing that?"

"Why not? As long as I use my hands instead of my legs there aren't any problems when I'm up here."

"You could fall and get killed."

Dick snorted. "From this height? Couple of broken bones and that's it." Either Dick's dealt with a lot of jumpers or he's thought about this way too much. He looked at Frank and sighs. "Fine, if it makes you feel better I'll come down." He started to move across the rafters, still balanced perfectly on his hands. Suddenly, there was a clank and Dick and the bar he'd been balanced on both started to fall. Dick grabbed something from his belt and threw it, and as it trailed out Frank saw that it was rope of some sort, with a weight on the end Dick threw. That end wrapped around one of the rafters and Dick swung down as if he was Tarzan or one of those swashbuckling heroes swinging from the chandeliers, except he did it better in some indescribable way. And yeah, part of it was that this is real and not just some actor pretending he's a hero, but another part of it is just that Dick looks right doing this. Even in the short time he was airborne some of the tension Frank hadn't even known was there until that very moment, tension which had always been there oh-so-subtly, melted away. And then Dick landed and rolled like he was used to doing it (and maybe he was; after all, he had that trapeze which he'd obviously used in the past, and he did a lot of gymnastic even now), only something obviously went wrong because when he came out of the roll he clutched the ankle on his good leg.

"What's the matter?" Frank asked.

"Sprained my ankle," Dick said in an everyday tone of voice, like he sprained his ankle all the time. "Do you mind getting the first aid kit for me?"

The first aid kit here is, of course, every bit as well-stocked as the one at Dick's apartment, but Dick just gets out an Ace bandage and uses it to wrap his ankle.

"How do you know it's a sprain and not a break?" Frank asked. "Maybe you should go to the emergency room."

"No," Dick growled. "This isn't an emergency. And trust me, I can feel the difference between a sprain and a break. I've certainly had enough of each." He started to stand up.

"What are you doing?" Frank demanded. "You can't walk like this."

"It's only a sprain," Dick said, exasperated. "I can handle a little pain."

"If you try to walk on that I'll tell the captain you didn't go to the doctor about it."

"You wouldn't." Dick sounded disbelieving.

"I would." Normally trying to stare Dick down is an exercise in futility, but Frank was sincere and Dick actually backed down.

He sighed. "There's a wheelchair over there somewhere." He waved off into the esoteric equipment corner of the room. Most of the equipment there was so obscure that Frank didn't even know what it was, much less how to use it. He had no doubt that Dick not only knew what it all was, but also that he was a master at using it. Even that corner of the gym is laid out neatly, though (he'd never thought of Dick as a neat or organized person, and he certainly wasn't with his files of with his desk, so perhaps he'd learned gym organization etiquette from somebody who was obsessive about it), and he finds the wheelchair quickly.

It wasn't one of those institutional wheelchairs they force you to use in hospitals. No, it was a wheelchair which looked like it was meant for heavy use, for somebody who would be stuck in it for the rest of their life. The handles were removable, and Dick removed them as soon as he wheeled it over.

"Thanks," Dick said shortly, reluctantly, and left the gym.