Yusaku grunted under his breath, so quietly I almost didn't hear it at all. Turning my head slightly to watch him work, I silently wondered what he had just reacted to.

Yusaku appeared to be working much slower than when he had started today. Hours ago he had been typing lines of code at lightning speed, and sipping his coffee every now and again. Now he was long out of coffee, and his speed had dramatically reduced as a result.

"You're staring. Have I written something wrong?" Yusaku asked blankly, noticing that I had been staring at his computer.

"Oh, sorry. Do you want me to check?" I asked, taken aback by the unexpected question.

"No. You just seemed to be bothered by something in my general direction."

We both resumed writing line after line of code on our separate devices. I typed as much as I could, trying best to reach the end of my program so I could begin debugging and get all this work over and done with. But after five minutes of hard work, I heard Yusaku make the noise again. I peeked over at him and his computer again, but it appeared nothing of note was happening. I figured it must have been nothing, and went back to minding my own business.

Like clockwork, another five minutes passed and Yusaku made the noise again. Shooting a glance in his general direction, I saw nothing out of the ordinary once again. As I resumed what I was doing, I couldn't help but wonder what was going on with Yusaku. He looked fine, if not a little sluggish at coding at this point in the night. I considered that I could perhaps ask him what the problem was, or if there wasn't any I could inquire as to why he was making a noise like that at a regular interval.

Five minutes passed but this time there was no noise. I kept working.

Six minutes. Maybe I had missed the noise?

Seven minutes. I tuned out of my work and focused on what I could hear in the room. The whirring of our devices, my breathing, Yusaku's breathing… No typing was being done. I looked to my side at Yusaku, and saw he had stopped working too. But perhaps he hadn't stopped working when I did; He had fallen asleep.

"Yusaku?" I said. His eyes remained shut. "Yusaku?"

Gently, I shook him until he woke up.

"Mmmm… What…?" He seemed a little dazed.

"You fell asleep." I informed him.

"Sorry." He apologized and got back to programming.

From then on, I was only half focused on my work. Every few seconds I would peek over in Yusaku's direction and see if he had fallen asleep. As I had started, it just seemed he was awake and wanted to get his code done. However, with every time I looked at him, his eyes seemed a bit more sleepy and his eyelids a bit more droopy. His typing speed slowed down with each passing second. At the end of five minutes, his eyes had shut completely. But then as his head fell forward slightly, he suddenly fought to stay awake, making a quiet grunting noise in the process. He lifted his hand and rubbed his eyes, then went back to coding.

With my curiosity satisfied, I went back to working on my program. But I couldn't help but wonder if I should tell him to stop for the night. It took three more sets of five minutes, and subsequently three more cycles of Yusaku almost falling asleep for me to draw the line.

"Yusaku, you aren't going to get anything productive done if you keep dozing off like that."

"Sorry. I'll try harder to stay awake." Yusaku said, trying to perk up and look less sleepy.

"No, Yusaku. A tired mind isn't capable of making anything useful. Call it a night."

"I'm fine. I'll get this done." Yusaku protested.

"You're going to fall asleep well before then."

"No, I feel fine. I can get this done, it isn't a problem."

I sighed deeply and nodded, allowing him to keep going. Yusaku turned his attention back to his monitor. I also went back to work.

For half an hour, Yusaku shook himself awake at regular intervals and continued coding each time. However, with each time he looked even more like he would pass out due to exhaustion. Perhaps now was a more appropriate time to tell Yusaku to rest.

"That's enough Yusaku. You're so sleep deprived that you look like could die any moment now."

"No… I'm…" Yusaku managed to say, yawning before he could finish his sentence.

"Honestly, listen to yourself… Go and rest right now, Yusaku."

"I know my… limits… I'm fine…"

"Clearly you don't. You're going to bed right now. I'm not giving you a choice."

I reached over to his screen and powered it off.

"Ryoken... I can still work."

"No. You can't. I can tell you're pushing yourself right now, just trying to hold a conversation. Go and rest."

Yusaku stared me right in the face, "I'm not... going to go... and sleep."

"Oh come on, stop being so stubborn."

Sighing, I stood up, swivelled Yusaku's chair around and picked him up.

"Ryoken… what the…?" He tried to sound defiant, but was too tired to effectively do so.

"What? It wasn't like you were willingly going to go rest by yourself. I can't believe the things I have to do to get you to do the reasonable thing sometimes…" I muttered, slightly annoyed.

Yusaku only then noticed how fed up I was with how stubborn he was being. He remained quiet as I carried him over to the couch and placed him down.

"So, are you going to sleep as I've asked?"

"Mmm… Yes…" He said, sounding defeated. He curled up a little and groaned slightly.

"Good." I praised him, then pulled a blanket from the end of the couch over him. He snuggled drowsily into the blanket and closed his eyes. It seemed that almost instantly that Yusaku fell asleep.

"Idiot. I told you that you needed sleep." I whispered under my breath.

For a while, I knelt next to the couch and watched him, making sure that he wasn't somehow pretending to sleep and was going to get up and keep working. As I watched him, he would toss and turn at times. Sometimes he would make small noises. Typical sleep things.

His actions as he slept weren't the only thing I saw as I sat there. I found, as I looked at him, that I could see child-like qualities in him. When he was awake he seemed cold and dulled. As he slept, his features had relaxed and his face became gentle. I could only find one word to describe how Yusaku looked. Soft. I briefly wondered if that was what he was like on the inside too. Perhaps Yusaku had a cool and hard exterior to hide a warm and soft interior. Maybe he had a side that only could been seen when he was asleep.

Realising that I had work that I had to get back to, I stood up. I was about to turn to walk back to my computer when I felt a temptation call me. Who knew when I would see Yusaku like this again? Slowly, I reached out for Yusaku's head, and hesitated. Cautiously, I let my hand make contact with Yusaku's hair and weakly pet him.

I awoke on a couch, blanket wrapped snugly around me. I spent a moment recalling where I was and readjusting to being awake. Morning light filtered into the room and forced my eyes to adjust. I stretched my arms, yawned a little, then climbed off the couch from under the blanket. I figured that I should probably finish off my program.

I wandered back to my computer. When I got there, I felt a little surprised by what I saw.

"Ryoken?"

Ryoken was sitting in front of his computer, but he wasn't working on his program. He was sleeping.

I sighed. "You're such a hypocrite…"

At that moment, I noticed how vulnerable he looked. I noticed how different he seemed now to how he normally was. Usually his determined and confident exterior was obvious from the moment you first lay eyes on him. It felt like a barrier he would put between him, the world and everyone in it. But right now, he seemed inviting and calmed. I decided that it suited him.

I could only think of one work to accurately describe how he looked right now. Soft.

And briefly, I wondered if this is how he was on the inside.