[RL WITH SULU AND MCCOY]--backdated to the 29th

[torchwoodteaboy]

Ianto wasn't sure whether he was grateful that Sulu was able to carry him or not. On one hand, he really couldn't walk without passing out anymore, so he supposed it was really for the best that Sulu was as strong as he was, but at the same time...it was rather embarrassing, to be carried through the hallways of the Enterprise, having people that

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[takeitoutofpark]

Where Ianto may have had doubts and worries about all of this, Sulu had found himself waking up resolute and sure of what was going to happen. The plan was this: Sulu would take Ianto to the medbay, McCoy would snark and chew them out, and then McCoy would fix whatever was going wrong and Ianto would be fine again. He had nothing but good things to say about his CMO and, in all honesty, if there was anyone he trusted to be able to handle this, it was him.

"It'll be better than the last batch," Sulu responded easily, keeping up the lighter tone Ianto was trying to adopt to make it easier for the other man. Ianto was uncomfortably light, really, considering his height and stature, and it drove home just how ill Ianto really was. At least he knew that things would be getting better, hopefully. Sulu shot an ensign a sharp glance as she stared, sending her on her way. "I think some of them assume I'm having an affair with my man eating plant."

Finally, they had arrived at the medical bay. Sulu was honestly unsure where he should situate Ianto, but the nearest empty medical bed seemed like the safest approach and so he settled the other man down onto it, brushing a hand briefly through Ianto's hair and smiling at him. "See? That was only a little humiliating, and next time, I'll let you carry me when I get wounded on an away mission." Despite his light tone, though, there was still some layover worry from the night before; he'd let some of it show to McCoy when they'd talked about bringing Ianto in, but now he was trying his damnedest to rein it back in.

[bornsnarky]

McCoy looked up from his goddamn paperwork when he heard the main sickbay doors open. He could just see through the crack in his office door. Ah, Sulu and his friend. Ianto, Sulu's admirer.

Judging by the tenderness in Sulu's movements, the admiration didn't just go one way. Hell, looked like Sulu brought his boyfriend back from the dead. He didn't begrudge either kid their happiness, and he was in fact pleased for Sulu, who could use some company. But could this get any messier?!

McCoy got up from his desk, rubbing his aching back, and headed out to see them. "Hello, there," he said briskly, peering up to check the biobed readings. "I'm McCoy, as you know. Let's see what we can do for you, Ianto."

His eyebrows shot up as he took in one particular reading, but all he did -- for now -- was throw an exasperated glance Sulu's way. How long had they waited before coming in?!

[torchwoodteaboy]

Ianto raised an eyebrow at Sulu at the idea of him carrying Sulu anywhere. Maybe it was just because he was feeling so weak at the time, but he really didn't know if he could do things like that, even so. He wasn't really one of the strong, carrying people around when they needed to get from place to place types, after all. He was more of the...go elsewhere to get someone or something that could do the job for him types instead.

Of course, he didn't get to say any of that before a man was headed toward them, introducing himself and then not even waiting for either of them to respond before he set about doing his work. Ianto...felt the need to fill the silence anyway. "Ah, I'm... I'm Ianto. Ianto Jones," he said, his voice light, speaking clearly in case his accent was an issue. You never knew, after all. He watched curiously as McCoy took some readings from...the bed he was on? How did that even work? Sulu'd only just set him down, he hadn't attached him to anything. Shouldn't some sort of wires or something be necessary to get readings off of him.

"I'm... I'm grateful that you're willing to see me on such short notice, Doctor McCoy," Ianto said, deciding to play up the being polite, seeing the exasperated look the other man was shooting at Sulu. "Especially since...well. I'm not one of your crew. I'm not your obligation. You didn't have to agree on my account, or anything..."

[takeitoutofpark]

Sulu was completely and honestly humbled under McCoy's glances - well, at least he was very good at looking humbled. Truthfully, the majority of this had been out of his hands, and like he'd told McCoy before - Ianto was the one who had held off on telling Sulu how bad it was. If Sulu had known, McCoy would have no doubt met Ianto before he'd even arrived on the community.

Still, when Ianto started doing very well on being humble on his own, Sulu couldn't help but smile a little. Truthfully, Sulu would have been more surprised if McCoy had turned down helping Ianto than agreeing. For all his gruffness, Sulu knew McCoy wasn't above helping someone in need. Still, it didn't hurt to show some gratitude. Still... Sulu couldn't make much out of the biobed readings, but the fact that McCoy had given one of them a very perturbed look - he didn't miss that. "I'm sorry I didn't get him in sooner," he said, "But... really, thank you for this."

[bornsnarky]

McCoy didn't quite know whether to be amused or horrified that Ianto seemed almost scared of him, though it was only right and proper that Sulu should apologise. That was the hierarchy on the ship, dammit. When they were in battle or whatever, sure, Jim was in charge. But outside of that, the CMO should be top of the heap.

McCoy fell back on what was a perfectly adequate bedside manner no matter WHAT Jim said.

"It's fine," he said absently, picking up the padd at the end of the bed to start making notes. "Can't say I'm exactly in the habit of treating refugees from the twenty-first century, but a patient is a patient is a patient."

He looked up and gave Ianto a gruff half-grin. "We'll get you sorted out, okay? Now, these instruments can only do so much, so how about you tell me about how you're feeling?"

[torchwoodteaboy]

Ianto wasn't sure he necessarily agreed with the choice of the term 'refugee' there, but he let it go, especially after McCoy's next question. Ianto took a deep breath, and let it out slowly, glancing at Sulu for a moment, before lowering his eyes. "I... I've been better," he said, starting out, but he knew that that wouldn't be enough for the doctor to go on, so he summoned the willpower to say more.

"...I'm tired," he said softly, honestly. "I'm tired, and I only just woke up, I didn't even move, didn't take a single step to get here, and already... I'm cold, too. I mean. I've always been cold, but. This is different. ...worse. And. Yeah." He struggled through his explanation. "It's been like that for, well. A month, now. But...recently it's gotten worse. I can't walk anymore without passing out, can't stand up anymore without seeing stars..." He ducked his head. "...I'm sorry that I didn't speak up sooner," he said. "I didn't...I had hoped that it would fix itself..." But he hadn't believed it would.

[takeitoutofpark]

Sulu went to the side of the bed not currently needed by McCoy and put his hand over Ianto's, making no effort to hide the move. McCoy was a little too smart and too on top of things to be tricked or misled, after all. He wasn't exactly pleased with how Ianto liked to preface everything by saying "I've been better," especially when that wasn't really the case.

"He hasn't been better," Sulu went so far as to say. He didn't want to, but... "You don't need to tell him that," he added to Ianto, carefully, "If there's anyone you want to be honest to right now, it's Dr. McCoy, okay?"

[bornsnarky]

McCoy felt his eyebrows crease. Things were definitely bad if Sulu wasn't even bothering to try to hide the extent of his concern for Ianto. Sulu wasn't exactly an emotionless Vulcan-type generally, he did show emotions, but he was much more inclined to put a good face on things and make people believe he was coping just fine. He wasn't big on talking about his relationships. At least, not around McCoy.

In other words, this was indeed serious, and Sulu gave more than two hoots about Ianto. Possibly five, even six hoots.

Ianto's information about his exhaustion wasn't good, but it was helping McCoy begin to put everything together. Something he could address instantly, though, even if he couldn't fix it, was the hopelessness in Ianto's voice.

McCoy forced himself to stop making notes, and to look at the two of them properly. "Ianto," he said gently. "I'm not gonna say this'll be easy. I don't have enough information yet. But I'm seeing things here I can work with. Symptoms I can ease. I'll figure it out. I don't know why the hell you've got no self-confidence, son, but you've got good support here with Hikaru, and you're just as damn important as any other person, okay? I've had a heap of idiots in here and I've treated them all. You're not an idiot and you deserve to be in good health."

[torchwoodteaboy]

Ianto lowered his eyes as Sulu reprimanded him. He hadn't meant it exactly like that, but...he knew where he was coming from, knew why he was scolding him and reassuring him to tell the truth--because he was worried. Ianto turned his hand under Sulu's to take Sulu's hand in his, nodding.

And then McCoy was after him as well, addressing his self-confidence issues, and Ianto was embarrassed that he was letting himself get so down like this, especially in front of two people who had so much faith in him, one who didn't even really know him very well at all. "Yeah," he said quietly, "I... I know that." Both that he didn't deserve this, he had just been in the wrong place at the wrong time, and also that Sulu was there for him. That there were people that cared about him, and he mattered. "I'm sorry. I've, well. I've never been much of an optimist, but. I'll try, yeah?"

He took in a deep breath, centering himself. "Is... Is there anything else you need to know? I mean. You do know how I..." He turned to Sulu. "You did tell him about...the video, on the community, didn't you?" They had briefly discussed how it might come in handy for describing exactly what happened to him, after all, but Ianto had been asleep when Sulu'd discussed it with McCoy--he didn't rightly know exactly what he'd told McCoy and what he'd left for Ianto himself to share.

[takeitoutofpark]

While Sulu did feel a bit bad that both he and McCoy were ganging up on Ianto like this, he wasn't about to take any of it back or relent. If he needed to say something, he would. When Ianto brought up the video, though, Sulu dropped his eyes to their hands for a moment before nodding.

"Yeah," he said, slowly, "I figured, like we were saying. It'd be the easiest thing. Though I don't think there are any documented species like the 456 in our universe." He looked up again, this time at McCoy. "I don't know if it helped, though."

[bornsnarky]

McCoy nodded. "Oh, yeah, it helped," he said quietly, repressing a shudder as he thought back to it.

He'd watched it three times; the first with the stylus gripped so tightly in his hand he'd nearly snapped it, then he'd forced himself to watch twice more so he could take proper notes. He'd seen death before, far too often, and could work through the horror of it to do what had to be done. But if other people's pain ever stopped having an impact on him, that'd be the day he'd hang up his stethoscope and retire.

[torchwoodteaboy]

Ianto bit his lip. He knew that there was information that the video didn't show, information that only he and Jack knew, because they'd been there, they'd died from it. Information that he hadn't told Sulu, because for all of his dark moods, he hadn't really wanted to talk about the darkest bits of it. The part where he actually died, that was.

"It... It happened really quickly," Ianto said quietly. "I could feel everything shutting down, and I knew what was coming, but... There wasn't anything I could do to stop it. It all just happened too fast. And then..." And then he'd died. In Jack's arms. But of course, McCoy and Sulu both already knew that, if they'd seen the video.

"When I came back, I... It took a few minutes to function again. And then...I must've slept for a day straight, after I got with it again." He looked at Sulu, checking to make sure what he was saying was right, because well. He hadn't been all that present, then. "I... I was fit to go home from the hospital a day or two after that, but. Things never really got any better. They just kind of hovered around the same tired, achy feeling, until...well. About a week ago, things started to get worse and worse as each day went on, but." He shook his head. "I...I couldn't think straight enough to be worried about it. Even now, I..." He looks up at the two of them. "I'm just tired..."

[takeitoutofpark]

Sulu didn't really want to break in and say anything, and he definitely didn't want to say anything that would be more incriminating than him holding Ianto's hand, but still. His hand tightened around Ianto's and he bit the inside of his cheek to keep himself from saying something that would either cut into Ianto's moment of honesty, or be completely unhelpful to McCoy.

So, instead he listened and waited for a moment where he could speak - not about Ianto's death, because he knew he couldn't do that, because he knew he hadn't even said the words since Ianto's resurrection - but instead he looked at McCoy and raised a brow. "Any of this sound like something a hypospray could fix?" he asked, knowing full well that the 456 didn't exist in his universe and were therefore very unlikely to be using a toxin McCoy just happened to have a cure for.

[bornsnarky]

Mouth quirking in a tired grin, McCoy said, "Yes and no. I can help with the exhaustion, but I'm not sure to what extent just yet, and that's only treating the symptoms anyway." He turned to Ianto. "I'll have to run a few tests and keep you here for a while, okay Ianto? Am I right in assuming that when you do sleep, it makes no difference, you wake up feeling absolutely no better than when you went to sleep?"

He resolved to have a quiet chat with Sulu privately, because Sulu looked like utter hell and obviously could use some more support.

[torchwoodteaboy]

Ianto nodded, not really surprised that McCoy had hit the nail right on the head. He knew that he didn't exactly look the specimen of health, even despite the fact that he'd done nothing but sleep and rest for the past month, it seemed. "It...doesn't really make that much of a difference, no," he said, quietly. "I... I honestly think that it might have, at the beginning of coming home. Like...I got tired a lot, but if I took a nap, I'd wake up and have a few hours of...well. Not a lot of energy, but. Definitely more than I have now."

He blushed a little, before saying the next bit. "After just going to sleep didn't seem to be working, taking a bath before I went to bed still let me wake up feeling a little refreshed. But. Recently, that stopped working as well."

He looked up at Sulu and McCoy. "It... It's fine if you have to keep me here. Jack knows where I am, and as long as you keep filling him in on what's going on," he said, looking to Sulu, "I don't see why there'd be an issue with that. It's not like I'll be making the trip back home on my own, anyway. Not... Not until you can find a cure for this." And he would, Ianto hoped. Both for his sake and for everyone else's. He was pretty sure that just about everyone was routing for him to get better, and he was going to try his damnedest to see that he did.

[takeitoutofpark]

Sulu usually had more time to work through his problems enough to hide them from others, and so it was no wonder that today his poker face just wasn't up to par. Still, he couldn't bring himself to try harder - after the argument with Jack and all the thoughts swirling around his head, Sulu just wasn't up to the challenge right now.

"I'll make sure he knows what's up," Sulu said, before looking to McCoy briefly. "He hopped aboard back... when everything started, and he managed to charm his way past most security." That, and he used Sulu's name to get his way. "So, so long as you don't mind - he might want to visit." He glanced at Ianto, knowing that if he had any problem with Jack visiting, he'd make some kind of face or noise to indicate it, rather than saying anything directly. "Obviously not while you're running tests, though."