"Oh, yeah, some of them are absolutely smart enough to be doing it intentionally. Just. The mindless oozes do it too."

"I was in history of artificing. So far it has proven useful if I want to make a shield holder using a six-thousand year old design and I have an assignment to figure out how one might use artifice to bury tens of thousands of hittites under a mudslide."

A junior, not from Boston, sits down at the Boston table.

"Hey! I'm James, I'm a junior, just going around checking that all the new freshmen have settled in OK, see if there's anything any of you need?"

Is that….normal. 

Raleigh gives Marcy a confused glance. 

It's so not normal! "Excuse me?" she says with she hopes is the right mix of three parts confused to one part offended.

This kid is not giving off creepy maleficer vibes, but he's sure giving off charming maleficer vibes and why the fuck else would a junior be going around meeting all the freshmen anyways.

"... I will take that as, you six are fine and don't need anything?"

"We don't need anything." Not from you anyway. Whatever his angle is cannot be good or he'd be pitching it to fellow juniors in some more reasonable manner than pouncing on them while they're eating.

"Alright! Good luck with your classes!" And he's off to check on freshmen at another table.

"...Anyone know what was up with that?"

Helpless shrug. “…If he were really sketchy I think probably Larisa would’ve said something?”

"Probably trying to sell us overpriced garbage."

"Or looking for vulnerable frosh."

“You’d think he’d do better for himself by focusing on the indie tables.”

"Yeah, seriously."

One of the Boston sophomores leans in and says, "I think he's more insane than scammy, for what it's worth. After all the shit that went down last year he started climbing on a table every Wednesday and telling everyone all the gossip he'd heard. Apparently he thinks mutual common knowledge of stuff will help, which isn't itself nuts, but like separately he's totally nuts."

"That's... he knows what this place is like, right?"

"I don't know that he does!" says the Boston sophomore. "I heard he got kicked out of his enclave for using more than his fair share of mana!"

"What the shit? Did they not warn him or did they warn him and he kept doing it?" asks Marcy.

"I don't know but either way it's fucked up!"

"He did what? Which enclave?"

"...I feel like there's got to be more to the story than that. I guess if he was doing that and also - so out of touch about things that he was clearly a liability and putting everyone else at risk...? Still seems like a big deal! I don't - have you ever heard of someone being kicked out of an enclave like that before?" 

"Not like that. Probably someone'd get kicked out for poaching or maleficing, but enclavers aren't desperate enough to do that. Someone in my cousin's year raped one of his 'clavemates and they cut him off after that, but that's the only case I've heard of."

"And I really cannot picture that guy maleficing! He's so..." Raleigh glances around, lost for words. "Earnest," he decides, finally. 

"I was told that's something to watch out for, actually. Charming older students who are interested in the lives of freshmen."

"Yeah, I heard some maleficers can hide it. The worst ones."

"It was Seattle," says the sophomore, "and they generally to have their heads on straight, though of course lately it seems like you can't count on anyone to have their heads on straight. He wasn't even just wasting mana on himself, either, he kept doing random unreciprocated favors for people. Which, you know, if an indie wants to be an altruist and die, whatever, but he had obligations! And now I guess he doesn't, so if he wants to be an altruist and die, whatever. But anyway if they caught him maleficing I think they would have made that known?"

This seems plausible to Raleigh. Well, the entire situation is weird, but a student wasting mana and being insubordinate about it for long enough - especially if they were as...weird in the head...as Holden seems to be... Yeah, he could see an enclave with limited slack deciding that was a liability they couldn't afford. 

(It's still upsetting. It's the sort of thing Landon and Larisa would only ever do as a very last resort.)