At that time the whole day was snowing and the sky was covered by fat clouds. Big snowflakes were falling down on the Namimori and hid the town under their white magic spell. There was no cold wind and so the little brunette could calmly sit on the roof of one house and watch the streets and people rushing through them.

The mood in Namimori was very nice - whole town was beautifully decorated with lights of various colors and in the middle of main square was tall Christmas tree with big colorful balls glittering there brightly. Every shop was adorned with red bow knots, paper snowflakes, garlands and wreaths and their display windows were full of all kinds of presents. In some places were even hanging mistletoes with pairs looking at them nervously.

It was Christmas time - people looking for presents on the last minute, lovers enjoying their time together, families with children running around happily and playing with snow. Tsuna smiled when he saw cow child and Chinese child snow balling with each other and two girls laughing and looking after them. He saw them from time to time and if he could he would go and played with them but...well he couldn't.

Tsuna sighed, he was thinking about it again. About joining humans... It was already weird he watched them like this, so he knew he shouldn't think about something like this, especially when it's impossible for him.

The brunette wasn't human, he was an elf helping Santa Reborn. Of course there were more elves like him, but for some reason they didn't care about humans at all. It was weird through when all they're doing is giving humans presents. When Tsuna thought about it, he was always different - he was clumsy, weak, stupid and slow. Others called him Dame-Tsuna and looked down on him. The brunette always laughed when they were making fun of him, but he was forcing himself. He had nothing in common with other elves and so watching humans let him escape to his imaginary world where he lived with them - where he had friends, family and...maybe...lover.

'Waaa! Thinking about love is always making me nervous!' he thought while holding his red cheeks. He looked at packed streets again and let out his warm breath which created a small cloud for a second. Envy filled his head as always while staring at those extraordinary creatures.

'It would be nice, if I had someone to give a present...' Tsuna wondered as he kept watching them. Humans couldn't see the elves so even if he went and walked with them in the streets, they wouldn't notice him. 'I wish I was a human..'

Suddenly the loud phone ringtone startled him and when he looked at the display, he gulped. The commander Lal Mirch, who was in charge of Namimori was calling him. Of course Reborn couldn't visit everyone, so he divided his work among bunch of commanders, who had their headquarters near each town they were assigned to. Lal took care of Namimori for a several years now - she was strict, strong and hated slackers. That's also why she and Tsuna weren't on the best terms. Tsuna took a deep breath a picked up.

"SAWADA! Where are you?! Your break ended already, so get your ass here! If you're not here in 5 minutes, you're dead!" Lal didn't even waited for his reply and hanged up. The brunette paled and quickly headed to their headquarters.

"Damn! I have to hurry! Why didn't I notice the time earlier?" he whined and jumped from roof to roof. Tsuna dashed quickly and tried to be careful with snow on the roofs but he still tripped occasionally. Cold wind blew against him and made his cheeks red. 'There's no way I can get there in 5 minutes! Gosh! I'll get yelled at again...'

As he kept his fast pace, he saw something unusual. The brunette stopped and almost fell when his feet slipped on the ice. Waving his hands in panic to prevent the fall, he managed to keep his balance. 'Waa! That was dangerous! But anyway what was that I saw just now?' He turned his eyes to the rooftop of the Namimori middle and noticed a dark silhouette standing there.

'Hmm? Who is it?' Tsuna stared at the mysterious person and found out that it was a raven haired man with long black coat and grey beanie. He had his hands in the pockets and cold eyes were watching Namimori with hostility. In that moment the brunette gasped, when he recognized dangerous prefect, leader of the disciplinary committee of Namimori middle, Hibari Kyoya. He was probably looking for someone who would dare to break the rules.

Tsuna guessed that this place must have been one of his favorites, because whenever he was around this school, he saw the prefect on the rooftop lying down and sleeping. He didn't know much about the boy, but from what he heard he was pretty violent and always looking for fights. The brunette was a bit afraid of him, but at the same time he kinda looked up to him.

'Since he's doing this for the safety of Namimori, he can't be a bad person, right?' was what Tsuna always said to himself whenever he saw him.

Suddenly something unexpected happened. As the brunette kept staring at the prefect, cold breeze started blowing and made him loose balance a bit. Tsuna shuddered and thought about going, when steel glare stopped him. The brunette looked at Hibari and paled.

'He's looking at me! ...wait, what?! There's no way he can see me! So how come he's staring at me like that?!' Tsuna felt panic freezing his body as he kept looking at Hibari as well. The prefect glared at him with stoic expression and it was as if he was piercing the brunette. The time slowed for a moment and Tsuna thought that it stopped completely. He felt his heartbeat going crazy and face blushing.

'What is this? Why am I shaking? Is it because of cold?' In an instant their strange encounter ended with Hibari turning away and going back inside the school. It lasted only few seconds but to Tsuna it seemed as hours and the way it ended so quickly was so sudden for the brunette, that he just stood there and watched the spot, where the prefect was for a while until he got a hold of himself.

'What the-? I don't understand! Just how was it possible for him to see me?' Tsuna rubbed his head furiously. 'Wait! Maybe he didn't actually see me! I bet he was just looking at something behind me! Yeah, that's how it was!' he thought as he laughed.

'It had to be like that! ...but still why did his glare made me so nervous? It really felt as if he was looking at me...' the brunette's face flushed a little, but he quickly shook his head. 'Let's not think about it and go.'

Tsuna turned and started jumping again. When he got out of Namimori, he entered nearby forest and climbed small hill, where he slowed and stopped. He looked around and when he found on one tree sitting owl he touched it carefully. That owl was just a puppet for activating secret door to their underground base, so when Tsuna pressed it big iron door appeared on the ground, opened and let him in.

As he walked down the wide hall he started meeting other elves, who greeted him by giving a mocking grins. 'Everyone here probably already know that I angered Lal...' he thought. The brunette turned bunch of corners and finally after the elevator took him down for a few floors he got to Lal Mirch's office. He stood there and squeezed his shirt nervously before taking a deep breath and knocking.

"Enter!" Lal said and when Tsuna peeked inside, she didn't even lifted her head for a couple of minutes from paperwork. The brunette gulped and closed the door. He wondered if he should start apologizing right away, but before he could Lal glanced at him and frowned.

"Finally! Took you long enough, Sawada!" she shouted and gritted her teeth in anger.

"I-I'm so sorry, commander! I was just-" Suddenly a flying mug hit his had, making on his forehead huge bump. "Ittee..." he whined and looked at Lal emitting dark aura.

"Shut up! Do you think I have time for your excuses?!" Her loud yelling made Tsuna shake in fear and for a second he thought a demon was in front of him. Then she sighed and rubbed her eyes. "Anyway go help to the section 9 for now and then come with everyone to the main hall."

"Hai!" Tsuna bowed and left as fast as he could. Lal was always like this around the Christmas time, so he was quite relieved that it was only a mug that was thrown onto him. The stress building up from all of this transformed her into a fury. 'Anyway let's go.'

After the elevator took him to ninth floor he headed to the room full of various plush toys where was other three elves wrapping them. Since the machines could wrap only the presents that were in the boxes, they had to do this by a hand. Mountains of toys seemed never ending and Tsuna really hated doing this cause it was so monotone and boring. 'I bet Lal sent me here on purpose...'

"Oi, don't stand there and help us." said one elf frowning at him.

"Huh? H-hai!" the brunette sit at one table - on one side lied large box with various kinds of wrapping paper and on the other were toys. In the room were two more tables but it looked like no one other than them was assigned here. As he started wrapping the toys, he heard quiet chatting between the elves.

"Why did the commander send Sawada? There are tons of better guys..."

"Yeah, he's totally useless here. In the end he will just drag us down."

"Hmph, it's clear that all he ever does is making mistakes. He should drop dead somewhere."

Annoyed voices mocking him didn't even care if he heard them and kept badmouthing him. Tsuna's hands froze for a moment and hair covered his eyes. Numb pain in his chest and frustration from hearing all of it made him feel miserable. Knowing everything they said was true, he couldn't say anything back to them and so he resumed his work.

The brunette was used to all kinds of mocking but it still hurt, after all it's not like he was clumsy because he wanted. 'Ignore it! Ignore it! Think about something different! ...that guy from this afternoon sure was strange and to make me freak out like that! Really...' He still thought that it was weird that he looked precisely his way, but it was impossible that he would actually see him. Tsuna kept remembering that event the whole time he worked so he successfully ignored the elves.

As the time passed they managed to finish the wrapping at 9pm and then they started loading the toys in the big boxes. When they were done bunch of forklifts arrived for them and took them to the main hall, where was the rest of the elves together with Lal Mirch. The main hall was enormous room with countless of snowmobiles and red sacks. Each snowmobile had a storage place for one sack and every time two elves rode one. Everyone was running from place to place in hurry to quickly fill the sacks and whole room was full of nervous yells and tensed atmosphere. Lal stood with other 11 elves by the little blackboard, speaking to them furiously and explaining them their routes for this year.

Whole Namimori was divided into 12 districts and one squad of six elves was in charge of one. Those 11 elves were certainly the squad leaders and Tsuna wondered where's the last one. He has never been a leader, he was only a part of few squads but he never wanted to be the squad leader. 'It's too much of a responsibility for me...' he thought.

Suddenly Lal Mirch noticed him and waved at him, telling him to come to her. The brunette flinched and looked around if she wasn't waving at someone else, but when he saw her pissed glare, he quickly ran towards her.

"What took you so long, Sawada?!" she shouted with burning eyes.

"HIII! I'm sorry, commander! I just got here." he squeaked.

"Tch! Never mind now!" Lal made irritated noise, clapping her foot restlessly. Tsuna glanced at other elves who watched him indifferently.

"What is he doing here?" they whispered. 'To be honest I'd like to know that too..' he thought.

"Anyway back to work! For this year it's been decided that you will take care of district 9, Sawada." the commander's statement shocked everyone who heard it. Tsuna stared at her with mouth wide open and from his surprise woke him up angered voice.

"You can't be serious, commander! Even though that district is very small, there's no way he can do it!" Other annoyed elves agreed and tried to persuade Lal to reconsider. It was known that district 9 was extremely small and usually when there was a new leader, he was sent there to try out his new role. It was somethings like training before sending him to other districts. But there was always the possibility that the new leader wouldn't be too good - in that case, he stayed there and took care of district 9 every year. Still it was very important to take care of that district and apparently no one believed that Tsuna would do it - not even the brunette.

"Shut up!" Lal yelled and silenced them in an instant. "It wasn't my decision to begin with! But I still believe Sawada will manage to make it tonight. So stop with your stupid arguments and listen to me!"

From that moment no one said a word. Lal finished her explaining and said to Tsuna to wait for her there. After an hour of waiting everyone finished their preparations and squads were ready to go. Lal Mirch made a speech encouraging the squads and thanking for everyone's hard work. After an applause big iron door was opened and one by one the squads left to the dark night. Only one snowmobile stayed there waiting for Tsuna and the brunette wondered where's the rest of his squad.

"So now that we're alone, I'll explain you your work for tonight." said the commander, coming towards him and erasing what was written on the blackboard. "As you can see you have no squad this year. You will be on your own so listen carefully. When you leave do your work as usual - you should make it even if you're alone, but remember when you're done, visit this house!" she said while pointing at her just drawn picture of district 9. Lal was pointing at one house which was a little bit aside from others.

Tsuna watched her hand, still shocked that he's alone for whole district, but at the same time wondering what's so important about that house. "Ehm, commander, why am I on my own and why do I have to visit that house?"

"Orders from Reborn. Anyway just do the usual route and then go there."

'There's no way I can do it!' Tsuna squeezed his shirt and felt his whole body shaking as he was panicking. In that moment warm hand touched his head and ruffled his spiky hair. The brunette looked at Lal Mirch, surprised by her action.

"Don't worry, Sawada. You can do it! I know you can. You were once a part of squad that was in charge of that district no? Then you're familiar with it, so there's nothing to be afraid of. Just don't let the panic cloud your mind and believe in yourself, alright?" Lal smiled at him and it was as if she blew away all Tsuna's worries. The brunette stared at her for a while and then he just nodded.

"...hai."

"Yosh! Well then be careful on your way." Slapping him on the back harshly, she sent him to his snowmobile and watched him as he sat on it and started up. "I hope you'll be able to enjoy Christmas more from now on and make a lot of friends as you always wanted. Goodbye, Sawada Tsunayoshi." she said, smiling and waving at him calmly. Tsuna wanted to ask more, but there was no time. He smiled and waved at her too and then left, diving into the dark night.