Eyes can be many different things; dreamy, sparkly, sexy, bright, alert…Yes, eyes can be many different things. But when the eyes hold inconsolable pain and everlasting sadness, there is little one can do. That's the type of eyes in one Rin Okumura. He never shows it but those words his own brother said to him, gun held at the ready, stung. More than stung, more than cut. Those words, 'just die', killed a part of Rin's heart that was already wounded from witnessing his own father's death.

Rin's eyes would never be the same and his smiles and laughs became forced. Rin put on a mask for the world; he vowed to never open his heart again to avoid the hurt. The mask was wonderful, covered everything…except his eyes. But, unknown to the elder Okumura, others had found their way past that mask into his closed heart and that mask hurt them. He started letting it down, little by little, till he thought he could just about call these people his friends.

The mask was up again in full force when his heart was betrayed once more. He would protect those…dare he call them friends…with his very being even if he knew better than to let that mask down again.
Now he stood in a wasteland of nothingness, preparing for his end. His mask could come off in this place of solitude. That is how Shiemi found him. She saw the mask gone and halted in her tracks; not because of the emotion clearly displayed on his face now, but because his eyes. His eyes were the same and it took his death sentence for her to realize that Rin Okumura was already dying inside and she wanted to be the herb that healed him.