"Yuki!"
Shiemi's cheerful voice pulled Yukio from his thoughts. He realized he had been sitting at the table for ten minutes, simply holding his sandwich without taking a single bite. Shaking off the dark places his mind had been wandering to, he put on a smile and waved at the ever cheerful Shiemi. He was surprised to see the rest of the cram school students walk up as well, greeting him casually as they took their seats around him and opened up their own lunches. He had been hoping for a quiet lunch to himself, but he couldn't really turn them all away on those grounds.
"Any word on Rin?"
Instinctively, Yukio glanced over his shoulder. He hadn't been able to catch sight of any Grigori goons following him about, but the way Mephisto had been talking he couldn't shake the feeling they were watching him. Then again, it could just be Mephisto messing with him.
Damn him. Always playing games…
"No. There's been a sudden increase in demon activity recently, so we're hoping Rin's case will die down," Yukio answered softly, still eyeing people at nearby tables.
Konekomaru nodded, "I've been hearing about that. They might even send us exwires out to deal with some of the lower level demons because they're running short on exorcists."
Shiemi shivered a little, "I hope it's nothing too scary!"
Bon was frowning, "They must really be stretched thin if they're willing to send us into the field. I wonder what caused this?"
Yukio looked back down at his sandwich, still completely untouched. With a sigh, he dropped it back onto his napkin. His appetite had vanished, anyway.
"It probably has something to do with what happened on Mt. Fuji," Izumi said matter of factly, resting her chin on a fist. Shima looked completely unnerved by her blase comment.
"Why would you say something like that?"
"Well, all this demon activity started after that, right? And what happened was pretty unusual; I've never heard of using a god's heart to control demons. It can't be a coincidence that something like that happens right before an unusual amount of demon activity starts, right?"
"You may have a point," Bon murmured, stroking his own chin.
"But if you are, then I hate to think what that means for all of us," Konekomaru observed, then turned to Yukio.
"What do you think, Okumura-san?"
"Yuki? Are you alright? You look kind of pale," Shiemi asked after a moment of silence. Abruptly, Yukio stood, eyes hidden by a glare on his glasses.
"Excuse me. I forgot about some paperwork I had to file," he hurried off, shoulders stiff as he walked away. Shiemi looked after him, concern in her eyes. Beside her, Bon narrowed his own eyes.
"That guy knows something."
"Of course he knows something. He's way higher up than us nobodies," Shima shrugged.
"Yeah, but we've been through enough together, you'd think he'd share a little!"
Konekomaru tried to placate Bon, "He's probably just worried about his brother!"
"Yeah, but doesn't he think the rest of us might be worried too?" Izumo huffed, then blushed when everyone looked at her in surprise, "Not about that idiot! About the demons!"
Yukio didn't hear any of this as he walked away, but the truth was he didn't know anything. All he had was some subtle hints from Mephisto that something more might be going on with Okuninushi's heart shard.
He wandered to the dispatch office, wondering where the Order was planning on sending the cram school students.
"Oh - they're not needed anymore. Everything is under control."
"Under control? We've all been running around like crazy and have just barely kept all these demons contained!"
"It's really strange, a few hours ago the demon activity suddenly dropped in this area. It looks like whatever had them riled up is over with."
Yukio frowned, "That doesn't make any sense!"
"None of this makes any sense. Here, take a look if you want."
The senior exorcist gestured to his desk, which was filled with computer monitors and papers stacked in haphazard piles. Several phones were lined up on the far side of the desk, and one of them began to ring. The older man answered, and Yukio helped himself to the information scattered across the screens.
In a moment, the exorcist finished his phone call and turned his attention back to Yukio, "Yeah, so as you can see, pretty much all activity has died down."
"Except here," Yukio stated, pointing to a map on screen.
"Oh yeah, but that's way out of my jurisdiction. I'm only in charge of this area."
"Do you mind if I write down some of these locations?"
He didn't wait for an answer before whipping out a notepad and scribbling down the coordinates before giving a nod and smile to his fellow exorcist and stepping back out into the hallway. Immediately his smile melted off. All these coordinates were from one country - specifically one area in that country.
New York, U.S.A.
Logan hadn't disclosed the location of Xavier's school before leaving, insisting on keeping it a secret, but Yukio knew without a doubt this must be where Rin was. And whatever was happening over there, he was in trouble.
Rin was in trouble. Deep shit. No matter how hard he tried to make things work, bad things kept happening to him.
He stood in the doorway, bags crammed under his arms, sword over his shoulder, and stared into the room.
Bobby sat inside, staring back.
Had the Professor done this on purpose? Was this some sort of punishment? This Bobby kid had to hate Rin now, or at least think he was a freak. He was pretty sure Bobby was going to get up and punch him at any moment - or maybe use some weird mutant power on him? Sweating bullets, Rin nervously shuffled just outside the room.
"Oh...uh...sorry...this is the room they assigned me…"
Bobby snapped out of his trance and jumped to his feet, approaching Rin. At first Rin thought they were about to have a rematch, but instead Bobby took some of Rin's bags and carried them into the room.
"Oh - thanks."
"Sure. Listen man, I'm sorry about earlier. You're new here, and I shouldn't have gotten so riled up."
"No, no, I'm always rushing into things. I'm a real dumbass, it's fine. Besides, you were the one who almost got hurt, so I should be the one apologizing," Rin waved his hands in the air, then scratched the back of his head and let out a forced laugh. He was always terrible with apologies and this friendly small talk. But Bobby just laughed.
"Dude, it's fine. We're cool, right?"
"Yeah," Rin said, smiling too widely. It had been a terrible day - it was great to finally meet someone friendly. Maybe he could fit in here after all.
