0016: Who needs sleep? You're never getting it, 2007-2020

01: 2007

"Yancy, wake up! Mom's making pancakes!"

The beginning of most mornings went by without incident. Jazmine, out of the three of them, was the first the rise. She prided herself on etiquette and timely arrival to the dining table when their mother was downstairs getting things ready. Raleigh was second to rise. Wound up so tight from recuperating, it was hard to maintain a normal sleep pattern with all the noise he made running around the room.

"Yaaanceey! C'mon, wake up!"

Yancy, for all his seniority over the two, was never an early riser. His mother chalked it up to the fact that he was overdue by a week when she was pregnant with him. Taking into account that his father was also a late riser and late birth, Yancy figured no one would really hold it against him for waking up twenty minutes later than the rest of his siblings on a weekend.

"Alright, fine, more pancakes for me," Raleigh rolled off his brother's still form and walked toward the bedroom door. Yancy rolled back into his default position on his right side and tucked his arm under his pillow. Raleigh opened the door slowly, letting the hinges squeak until they were obnoxiously too loud to ignore.

Yancy still didn't budge. Raleigh knew he shouldn't be taking Yancy's inability to get up personally, but he did not want to have to deal with Jazmine's teasing alone. Stepping out of the room, Raleigh walked backward until his back hit the wall. He pushed away from the wall and dashed into the room, he jumped forward, the momentum carried him across the small space between him and Yancy's bed.

"Wake up!" His little brother's weight knocked the sleep out of him; he rolled reactively, trying to throw him off his side. Their combined weight buckled the legs of the bed and went the frame crashing to the ground.

"Raleigh!" Yancy was sitting upright, bed hair likening him to that angry bull with its horns aimed right at him. Raleigh scrambled off the bed as his brother moved to assault him with his pillow.

02: 2010

They lived separated for three years once their parents got around to cleaning out the attic. The empty space above their shared room was prime real estate; out of the way and isolated. So naturally they fought each other for it in a game rock paper scissors.

Jazmine got the room in a three-to-two vote, their parents siding with their little sister. Yancy was left with her bedroom, complete with pink and lavender walls. Eager to embrace his manhood, he used his allowance to buy sky blue and timber wolf paint and was quick to attack the walls of the vacant bedroom.

The house smelled of paint and primer for weeks, but Yancy deduced the displeasure of smelling it made the work all the more rewarding. Once he was done, he stripped the room of tape and newspaper and slowly began to file his belongings into the room adjacent to Raleigh's. His brother played at being happy to be rid of him, but every now and again Yancy would spot the look of disappointment on his face. It's was gonna be hard for him, but he knew his brother would adapt.

Yancy worked to get adjusted to the space, and the fact that he'd no longer fall over his brother's shoes or hard candy. The space was alarming, but the silence was nice and so was shutting his door.

Shutting his door. The sense of possession did wonders for his ego. Yancy was king of his own roost, free to rule his invisible subjects without delegating with his little brother.

Having his own room, however, did not dissuade his brother's morning ritual: Attacking him with his pillow. In fact, it only seemed to make his activities worse. It didn't matter where he was, as long as he was sleep, Yancy would ultimately find himself walking right into a pillow that seemed able to attack him from all the sides. Listening to his brother cackle disappear all the way down the hall, pillow covering his head in case of retaliation, drove him mad.

Raleigh was assassin with a pillow and he knew Yancy couldn't catch him because he was too far removed from his own body functions to actually sum up the brain cells to chase him. The last time he did that, Yancy ran straight into his door.

So, instead of plotting revenge Yancy got wise and locked his door. Afterward, he told his mother that Raleigh was still pranking him with his pillow.

Raleigh got six week's worth of his chores to deal with as punishment.

03: 2017

There really wasn't anything to do except wait. Yancy had walked to and from Grand Central Market and returned to the Shatterdome in hopes of killing time, even at the risk of getting caught outside once the sirens started sounding. The Kaiju still hadn't made landfall. He wanted to ask what it was doing out there, but thought better of it. Sitting next to his brother, Yancy folded his arms and leaned against the wall.

Across from them Romeo Blue's pilots, Bruce and Trevin Gage stood at attention, their white Drivesuits looking in far better condition than their own. "How do you figure those guys can stand there for so long?" Raleigh inquired in a low whisper. Yancy yawned, "I have no idea", and much to his brother's displeasure, let his head rest on his shoulder.

"Hey, I'm not a pillow," Raleigh complained half-heartedly.

"You're the only thing around here soft enough to sleep on," Yancy replied, sinking further into the recesses of his mind. Raleigh rocked back and forth, hoping the motion would wake his brother. Yancy remained where he was and just readjusted his arms.

"You better not drool on me," Raleigh muttered.

Yancy grunted and kept chasing sheep until he was completely under the lull of sleep.

The alarms went off almost an hour after his brother dozed off.

"Romeo Blue, report to bay 01, Kaiju Signature, Category III-"

Raleigh, unaware he'd fallen asleep himself, sat upright, head switching back and forth.

"Gipsy Danger, report to bay 03. Kaiju signature, Category III, codename: Yamarashi-"

Bruce and Trevin were already moving toward their bay and younger Becket had to wonder if they stood there that entire time. "Yo, Yance! Wake up!" Raleigh rolled his shoulder, bumping his brother in the face. Yancy sit upright, drool in the corner of his mouth. "Kaiju, got it, I'm up," They stood up in unison and moved in the opposite direction of the Gage brothers toward bay three.

04: 2020

Tendo was the first notice Yancy was sleeping through mission debriefs and drops. Whenever he visited the LOCCENT, his eyes were always at half-mass, every muscle in his body expressed weariness, right down to his smile.

Tendo often wondered what the Becket boys were doing that kept the older brother falling asleep on his feet and his brother remaining as vibrant as ever, no matter the situation. It was becoming a practiced ritual, Yancy in a constant state of drowsiness while his brother did his best to rattle him from the throws of sleep.

"Marshall Pentecost on deck," Tendo announced automatically as the commanding officer moved to stand beside him. His hands glide across the control panel like second nature, reflex memory seeing him through the necessary procedures. Gipsy Danger's head ceased turning and fitted itself to the base of its neck, protective flaps moving into position behind and beside her.

"Gipsy Danger, ready and aligned, sir," The voice belonged to Raleigh, who usually never signed off on Gipsy's alignment. Tendo let his eyes wander over to Yancy's vital. His heart beat was slow and steady, dipping back and forth.

Like he was sleep.

"Uh, hey, Rals, my man-"

"What's up?"

"Is your brother sleep?"

"Uh…" Tendo could imagine Raleigh leaning back against the harness to look over his shoulder at his brother. Tendo and Pentecost got their answer soon enough when the sound of soft breathing echoed over Yancy's com. Oh, jeez. "…Uh, yeah, yeah, he's sleeping," Raleigh's tone was bewildered.

"Would you be as so kind as to wake him up, Mr. Becket?" Pentecost tone never changed in pitch but his look on his face definitely promised discipline was on the horizon.

"Yes, sir," Raleigh cleared his throat. There was a moment of silence followed by, "So, I heard they were cancelling Bob's Burgers."

"No, I love that show," Yancy's response was immediate, but his words were slightly slurred, signifying his awareness was not at one hundred percent. "Did I fall asleep again?"

"You did, Mr. Becket," Pentecost answered before his brother did. "I'll have to recommend that you and brother remain behind this drop."

"That's not necessary, sir, I'm totally aware now," Yancy protested meagerly.

"Your awareness is questionable, Ranger. I can't have you falling asleep in combat, not at a time like this," Pentecost rebuked. "I am I clear?"

"Yes, sir," Yancy drawls.

"Goddamnit, Yanc-" The familiar click of the com shutting off on Gipsy's end followed suit, Tendo cast an uneasy glance toward the Marshall. "Get Miss Callahan on the line, see if she can't figure out why I have an insomniac on my hands," Pentecost ordered.

Tendo was pretty sure that pleasure belonged to someone else, but acknowledged the order all the same. Yancy and Raleigh departed from Gipsy Danger steamed, Raleigh looking like he wanted to smack his brother upside the head for sleeping on the job.

05: 2019

Yancy has resigned himself to hating the mornings. Drills, deployments, maintaining an early morning routine; all of it disagreed with the natural impulse to sleep through half the day. He found himself climbing down from the bed, greeted by the sound of Kasabian's "Club Foot" playing loudly on the radio sitting on the shelf. There was also the distinct sound of his brother's off-key delivery falling out of unison with the singer's wail.

A mug sat on the desk across from their bunk. He knew it was for him. Snatching the first thing he could he pulls a fisherman's sweater over his head and immediately recognizes it as his brother's when it fits too snugly around his chest. He doesn't care. Pulling the chair out from the desk he sat down and gripped the mug and prepared take a sip.

The alarms go off overhead. The mug hasn't even left the desk. "For Chrissake," He mutters, defeated. Raleigh slides out of the bathroom, towel hanging lose around his waist as he dries the back of his neck with the other. "Get up loser, we're fishing- oh, hey, you're already awake!" Raleigh approaches him and slaps hard on the back. "C'mon, time for the drop!"

Yancy sighed dejectedly. He walked into bathroom with the mug in his hand. He walked out moments later, bleary eyed, but ready to face the day in San Diego.

Clawhook felt the full force of Yancy's sleepy retribution when it lost its head to Gipsy's Plasmacaster.

+01: 2018

November 7, 2018. Yancy's birthday and one of the rare occasions he was given leave to sleep in by his brother. Raleigh would slip out of bed, quiet as a church mouse falling over his own feet. Plenty of things were knocked down in the process of righting himself, but Yancy, as usual, slept right through it. His pillow lay discarded on the floor like a minor annoyance while he lay on his stomach, left arm acting as a substitute.

Reaching under the bed, Raleigh pulled out a messily wrapped box addressed to his brother and sat it between Yancy's legs. There was nothing fragile inside of it, Raleigh learned his lesson after Yancy unthinkingly chucked his last present onto the top bunk and was unable to save it from rolling off the other side. He ruined a perfectly good set of mugs he had tailor made for them (one with his name, one with Yancy's). As he withdrew his hands, Yancy's head turned toward him. Raleigh froze, his breath caught in his throat.

Yancy didn't move, didn't even crack an eye open.

Raleigh walked casually out of the bedroom and went about his day. Yancy didn't stumble out of their room until two in the evening, confused as to why his ears weren't ringing with music, alarms or brothers breathing in his face.

He didn't notice the present until the night after his birthday party.

Raleigh got him a pair of blue earmuffs with Gipsy Danger's logo's on each ear. "Aw, kiddo, just what I wanted." Yancy's tone was playful, but his brother knew when he was being sincere.

Raleigh snapped his pretend suspenders like a proud mother, already working on what to get him for Christmas.

Author's Note: Yes, it still lives. I surface from the planes of RLWTP (Real Life Writers The Plot) and bring you the second to last chapter of my Becket drabbles.