[RL WITH SULU][backdated to 03-20] Shoreleave: Part 2

[torchwoodteaboy]

Ianto had thought that one day on the planet had been exciting enough, but the prospect of another, when Sulu had mentioned it, had been too good to pass up. They'd had such a nice time on the beach, after all. It was only fair that they do a little exploring, let Sulu look for the alien plants that he would want to and get to watch the other man

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[torchwoodteaboy]

Ianto shook his head, laughing at the other man. "I'm not sure that I should be pointing out anything that might eat us to you. After all, you've got one for a pet, a meat-eating plant and all. Maybe I should just pretend not to notice and steer you around it. Then again." He quirked a smile at Sulu, sticking his hands in his pockets and rocking back on his heels. "Maybe I should. The idea of you completely geeking out about something around me is more than slightly intriguing. It'd help me feel better about completely freaking out on you the day before, and all..."

Ianto wasn't all that self-conscious about the fact that he'd been pretty much the opposite of cool, the day before, when Sulu had been showing him the planet and the ship in that little shuttle craft. Or, to put it in better terms, scaring him with his daredevil piloting skills, rather. He did feel slightly silly for it, because he knew Sulu and he trusted him not to kill him in a crash, or anything like that, but he'd always feel safer when his feet were on solid ground

[torchwoodteaboy]

The thing seemed to be pretty big, and Ianto was hoping that the fact that the trees were so tight together would form as at least some sort of protection to them from the thing. For how long and in what capacity, he wasn't entirely sure, but there wasn't a whole lot of time to stop and think about it as they ran. After all, he was pretty sure that the creature was gaining on them. He chanced a glance over his shoulder, automatically wishing that he hadn't. Yep, the thing was definitely gaining.

Of course, chancing that glance had Ianto looking away from where he should be looking to see where he was going, and so as he turned around his foot caught underneath a fallen branch in front of him and, without the knowledge that it was coming up until it was right there, pretty much sent him sprawling onto the forest ground, hard. At least he managed to avoid falling on his face, he thought to himself, as he came down hard on the palms of his hands instead.

[takeitoutofpark]

When Ianto's hand tore out of his own, Sulu came to a halt, turning around and expecting to see the thing chewing on Ianto's leg - or worse. He couldn't help feeling briefly relieved that Ianto had just tripped, and if there wasn't a giant man-eater coming right for them, he'd probably tease the other man for it. As it was, though, jokes were the furthest thing from his mind; instead, all he could think to do was run back to Ianto and grab his hands, hauling him up as the beast came thundering after them, gaining more ground every second they spent trying to get moving again.

He didn't bother asking if Ianto was fine, he just pulled him on - if Ianto's ankle was twisted or broken, he'd yelp or shout or do something, and then Sulu would consider a different approach to this whole running thing.

[torchwoodteaboy]

Ianto tried desperately not to trip over again as Sulu hauled him up, the only thing that was injured in that moment being his dignity, as they sprinted towards the thicker clustering of trees. He knew that they couldn't stop there, that it was just a temporary way to see if they could possibly gain some ground on it. The problem was that he had no idea how they were going to do to actually get away from the thing. It obviously wasn't going to give them much ground, certainly not enough to lose the creature in the dust, and short of finding somewhere to hide or climb or...squeeze through, perhaps, he wasn't sure how that was possible.

He was sure of a few things, though. One, that he couldn't keep running like this from the thing forever, and neither could Sulu. Two, that it would be very bad for that thing to catch up to either of them. And three, that he was absolutely terrified, and that adrenaline was probably his only saving grace in this moment, considering he was by no means an athlete by any means.

[takeitoutofpark]

Sulu pulled Ianto into the cluster of trees but didn't stop, forcing them to continue even as he heard the creature slow down slightly, like it was trying to decide if they were worth going after. He'd rather keep running until he couldn't hear it at all, if it was all the same to Ianto.

He knew he wasn't going to be able to run forever, just like Ianto wasn't going to be able to, but that didn't mean he wouldn't try. They mostly just had to put enough distance to be considered worthless to the creature, but Sulu wasn't sure when that would be.

The trees splintered as the thing burst through them, and Sulu swore, his chest tightening as he started to feel the burn of running in his lungs. He wanted to tell Ianto that he wasn't sure what they could do, but he didn't have the breath to waste on it, and besides - he was pretty sure Ianto didn't have an idea either. They'd put a good amount of distance between them and the beast, but it wasn't enough.

[torchwoodteaboy]

If Ianto had had the breath to spare to be swearing up a storm out loud, he probably would have been doing exactly that. As it was, he was putting every last ounce of everything he had within him into making sure that he kept going and that he kept his footing. Falling once had been bad enough. Falling again and losing the precious ground that they had gained in the meanwhile would be pretty near catastrophic, as far as Ianto was concerned. That deer thing hadn't been much differently sized than either of them, and the creature had nearly eaten it in one go. If it caught either of them... Let's just say that Ianto didn't want to find out what then.

He looked around, frantically, for some other sort of escape route, as the two of them hurtled through the underbrush. The vegetation that made it difficult for the beast to come after them as fast as it might have liked was also making it near impossible for the pair of them to run as fast away from it as they would have liked as well

[takeitoutofpark]

Sulu felt Ianto pull him in a new direction and nearly tripped himself, stumbling a little as he fought to adjust his speed in the new direction. He saw what Ianto saw, however, and forced himself to put on an extra burst of speed, trying to get there faster. If they could get to a clearing - even if it wasn't the river, they could probably lose the creature by doubling back before it had a chance to see which direction they'd gone. And if it was the river, they could probably use it as a way to get away from the creature chasing them.

Gripping Ianto's hand tightly, Sulu pushed through the last few yards of trees and underbrush and into the light that revealed the clearing. He stopped dead, however, when he saw what was before them. Only a few meters separated the treeline from a sheer cliff, and beyond that was nothing but the ocean. "Shit," Sulu panted, unable to catch enough breath to shout it, feeling desperately out of luck for the first time in a while.

[torchwoodteaboy]

Ianto did his best to stop in his tracks as fast as Sulu did, and not collapse right then and there as everything he had within him was screaming at him that this was too much, that he was overwhelmed by it all. He let out a sound of dismay, bending over slightly as he tried to get himself to breathe enough to be able to think beyond the fact that they were going to die, they were going to die on this unknown planet and get eaten by an alien and if he'd wanted to be killed by an alien than he could have stayed in Cardiff and at least then he'd have Jack and Jack's big gun with him to try and do something.

Only one thing was coming to mind, though, as he stared over the cliff down at the ocean, hearing the creature gaining on them from the forest behind them. It was going to catch them, and it was going to kill them, unless. "...jump," Ianto managed, albeit breathlessly. "We've got to... We've got...to jump..."

[takeitoutofpark]

In normal circumstances, jumping off a cliff would be the last thing Sulu would want to do. Hell, even now, with it being his only chance at survival, he was still thinking no way, no how. The sheer height of the fall had his head spinning and he wasn't even all the way to the edge - he could see that the cliff ended in smooth water, no rocks jutting up out of the ocean, but for all they knew, it could be three feet of water and twenty feet of coral or rock waiting at the bottom of their fall.

"Shit," he hissed, hearing the thing approaching and weighing his options. Fighting off a giant alien creature with no weapons and a minimal chance at survival, or dealing with what was at least a thirty foot drop that sort of made him want to throw up even thinking about it? It was an obvious answer, sure, but still...

Grabbing Ianto's hand in his, he swallowed hard and nodded, ready to jump the second Ianto made motions to do the same. He was in Starfleet, for crying out loud - 30 feet was nothing. Right?

[torchwoodteaboy]

Ianto's chest heaved as he tried to think of what else they could possibly do in that moment, other than the inevitable, but they were really out of options there. He looked around over his shoulder again at the thing coming at them through the trees and let out a noise of terrified frustration. He knew if they stalled any longer it could be the end of them, and if it came between the choice of jumping to his death trying to escape or resorting to the fate of being eaten alive, he'd prefer to try escaping instead

[takeitoutofpark]

Sulu shook his head at Ianto's apology and simply tried to catch his breath himself; when Ianto took off towards the ledge, Sulu gripped his hand as tightly as he could and ran with him, keeping the horizon firmly in sight as he leapt with Ianto over the cliff. He didn't want to look down, but he knew he had to, especially to make sure he landed feet first in the water, instead of headfirst. The sight of it sent his mind reeling, but he honed it in and remembered that he was probably not going to die because of this, because that just wouldn't be right. It was going to be his own sheer force of will, he decided, that kept them alive after this

[torchwoodteaboy]

Ianto kept a firm grip on the other man's hand as they fell through the air, trying to keep himself feet-down as well, not caring if maybe Sulu might be squeezing his hand tighter than was really at all comfortable. They were free-falling through the air, and he knew that this was probably one of the other man's biggest fears, the least he could do was suffer a bit of discomfort in support of the other man, after all.

As they hit the water, Ianto felt himself wrenched away from Sulu as he hit the water at a bit of a different angle than the other man and shot off to the side a little on a diagonal. Luckily, the water was clear, and he didn't go down too far, so it wasn't too much of a struggle to find his way back to the surface. Gasping for air, breathless not only from the run but also from the fall, Ianto broke through the surface of the water, panting as he looked around for the other man, treading water as he did so.

"Holy... Christ," Ianto said, looking up at the cliff that they'd come from, the sounds of the monster there,

[takeitoutofpark]

Sulu broke the surface just a second or so after Ianto did, staring up at where they'd come from with a dazed expression on his face. He was shocked that they had managed to really do that; that they'd run from some gigantic elephant thing and jumped off a damned cliff and survived. With a strained sort of laugh, Sulu looked to Ianto, treading water as he did so. "We did, huh?" he said, before looking back up and adding, "So much for there just being deer and fish on this planet."

He wondered how they'd missed something like that, but no one had really gone too deep into the jungle, so he supposed it was possible that they had just missed it. Whatever the case was, they were past it, and from the sounds of it, the thing was giving up on trying to follow them. He wouldn't either, if he were in its shoes, that was for sure. He laughed again, realizing that through the whole stupid thing, he still had his kit with him - it was floating some five feet away from them, having been let go of sometime during impact. "Holy shit, man."

[torchwoodteaboy]

Ianto just took a moment to tread water there, breathing, trying to catch his breath and make his heart slow down a little. Luckily, they could both swim. Ianto wasn't sure that he could have handled trying to rescue the other from drowning in the state that he was. He could only just keep himself from drowning, let alone do much of anything else. After a moment, his brain calmed down beyond the 'oh my god what in god's name was that' that it had been stuck in for the last while, and instead he could think enough to be able to turn and speak to the other man.

"Are you alright?" he asked, treading a little closer to Sulu. "What... What the hell was..." He couldn't seem to get the rest of that sentence out of his mouth, however. So instead he settled for the next thing that came to his mind, which was unfortunately, "...we just jumped off a cliff..."

[takeitoutofpark]

Sulu's breath was quickly coming under control; he was sort of used to running long distances on away missions, and so he was accustomed to trying to get his breathing under control quickly. Taking a few deep breaths, he considered their situation for a moment and then told Ianto, "I never want to jump off of a cliff again."

The fact that he'd done it wasn't really surprising, all things considered - Sulu could overcome pretty much anything if it meant surviving - but hindsight was 20/20 and he was starting to feel a little nauseous again just thinking about it. But, hey. They'd survived. He reached out and grabbed his kit before it floated away and looked at Ianto once more. "Through a forest, off a cliff and into the ocean." He grinned wide, "Who says dates can't be exciting?"

[torchwoodteaboy]

Ianto made a noise that was equal parts frustration and relief and 'oh my god we just nearly died', and ducked under the water for a moment, before popping back up again and treading out further, looking around. "I don't know about you, but I hope that fewer of them are quite as exciting as this one," he said, with a bit of a laugh, that had a bit of an unhinged tone to it that had everything to do with the fact that they'd just been almost eaten and then threw themselves off of a cliff.

He ran a hand through his hair, calming his breathing down, slightly. "Alright, well. That's done. Do you see a way out, anywhere? Not that I don't like swimming, but... I'd prefer not to have to scale a cliff-side to get out of here, if there's an option to do otherwise." He grinned at Sulu, sheepishly. "I don't know whether you know this, but I'm not really an athletic, sporty type. You're lucky I didn't pass out on you, running as much as we had like that." Never mind the fact that he had wiped out, that one time. That was neither here nor there.