Watchful eyes and blank smiles came the procession; that filing out to a brief moment of freedom from the tedium of academia. Rin had waved away two of her friends, Ikagura and Momoi with a sharpness about her that did not beckon argument or even a scowl by the way of rebuke. They understood that look, she knew, and would not dare approach her until whatever business she had was done. They, too filed out, looking a little more befuddled than the rest; but happy all the same. Rin had taken it upon herself to investigate the potentially supernatural melancholy that surrounded their new classmate; this Reiki Tsukihasa. It was a safe bet to assume that he would stay behind, and a safer gamble, one that could be easily explained if she happened to be wrong; which Rin Mizushima doubted, rarely wrong as she was.

 Once they were gone, a pseudosilence filled the room; a perpetual sense of static that lingered in the ears, broken only by the nearly sublime noise of the ticking clock mixed with the incessant chirping of birds from outside. It lasted only a few moments before Reiki seemed to notice her staring at him. 

 "My friends have already gone, Tsukihasa-san. Whether you need a babysitter or not is none of my concern," she was serious, at least about that matter, "but I have been given a task and I intend to carry it out as efficiently as possible," Rin shifted in her seat, sliding her pencil into place and stowing away her messy sheet of half-assed notes. "Staying here is your choice, as it is mine. Had you not opened your mouth about it, this conversation never would have transpired." She fixed him with a steely glare, searching through the lidded veil of his soul for more concrete answers about what plagued the boy.

 [i]If it's just depression, I'll leave him be,[/i] she told herself, [i]but I [b]have[/b] been given a task.[/i]

 "What is it that follows you?"