A young man was taking a casual stroll around Iwatodai, popping into the odd shop and chain-smoking as he went. He had left the dorm with the sole intention of buying a pair of gloves; of course in the end he had spent over ten thousand Yen on unnecessary crap... such was the life of Fukugawa Youhei. He paused at a discount wine shop, remembering something he had said to his dormmate Ikeda a few times now; the girl had saved his life more than once and each time he had promised her a drink in return. [i]How many do I owe her now? Three..?[/i] If they ever did go out of an evening, the girl could go the whole night on his favour alone... As he perused the the wares, Youhei wondered if the shop would even serve him; granted, he looked a little older than his eighteen years and had never had an issue getting tobacco, so maybe he would be in luck... After a few minutes, an exotic-looking yellow bottle caught his eye and (after a tense moment at the checkout) Youhei left as the proud, if temporary owner of a bottle of banana liqueur. He celebrated his flouting of legal age restrictions with another rollie and decided to head back to the dorm. Last thing he wanted was a friendly police officer asking awkward questions...

As he meandered homeward, Youhei's thoughts turned to SEES and Shadows, as they often did when he had nothing else to mull over. The Strega evoker he had claimed the other week was still a mystery to him, despite hours of disassembly and general fiddling with; the SEES ones just felt... [i]different[/i] somehow and he was determined to find out why. Youhei felt a little guilty about not confiding this in the others, especially Kirijo, but couldn't shake the feeling that it would be confiscated if they ever found out. Unfortunately and as much as he hated sounding so melodramatic, that evoker was something of a symbol to Youhei; it represented the first time he had taken a human life. He hadn't talked to the others about [i]that[/i] either and whenever he considered it, a sickeningly selfish fear rose within... [i]What if they... call me a murderer? What if they drive me away?[/i] Such thoughts had been circling his mind ever since he left the Tartarus atrium that night and probably would for many months to come.

Youhei stopped just around the corner from the dorm and took a deep, sobering breath, as was fast becoming his habit. When with the others he needed to keep his mask up and his smile friendly, lest they get a good glimpse of the side he didn't wish to share. After taking a moment to reconfigure his murky expression into a relaxed smile, Youhei sparked up again and headed round to the main entrance. To his mild surprise he found three strangers outside, clearly student types; come to think of it, the Chairwoman had mentioned a few new additions. Either they all knew each other or there was some deux ex machina business going on here, gathering them at this exact moment... Still, he stepped forward confidently; he was the senior one here anyway so he might as well greet them.

[b]'Morning, ladies and gents. Are you the new transfer students?'[/b] Youhei's gaze switched from face to face, noting each little idiosyncrasy. The girls looked fairly normal, but the boy took him by surprise. [b]'Are you American? Christ, didn't expect that. Thought I'd be the only semi-foreigner here.'[/b] He spoke English with a thick Yorkshire accent, so Youhei wasn't entirely sure the guy would understand him. [b]'So... uh... Welcome to the Iwatodai dorm. Come in, here I'll open her up...'[/b] Youhei waited until the three of them had filed past, then stepped in smartly behind them. As they settled in, he jogged over to the stairs and yelled up. [b]'Oi, Kirijo! Fresh meat!'[/b]