Chapter 2
The Best First Impression

Momo blinked. The last thing she remembered was that scary, scary thing getting close to her. And yet, here she was, alive, with blue skies above her. Warm sunlight was seeping through the rich foliage of high trees. The leaves whispered peacefully when slight, warm breeze moved through them, bringing the smell of fresh pine needles and grass.

Was she alive? Momo doubted that there was any grass and flowers in a stomach of a Hollow, no matter how big one.

She slowly sat up and pulled a twig from under her bottom. If she was able to be uncomfortable because of such silly thing, then she had to be alive, right?

"Hinamori? Abarai?"

Momo brightened, recognizing Kira's voice coming from somewhere nearby.

"I'm here!" she called, waving her hand in the direction from where she heard his voice, the twig still between her fingers.

It was a relief, to not be all alone. Wherever they were. Kira seemed to be fine. there were leaves in his hair and Momo saw in his eyes that he was as much disoriented by the whole situation as she was.

"I guess you don't know what had happened to us either?" he asked.

"Sorry," Momo shook her head. Then she looked around. "You think Renji is somewhere near?"

"I'm not sure if I'm hoping for that or for him to be with Captain Aizen," Izuru muttered. "We probably should see if we can find him. There's nothing else to do."

He tried to keep his face neutral, but Momo was very good at looking behind that sort of a mask. Toshirou was pulling that one on her for years. For now, Momo decided to just play along. If keeping a blank face was making him feel better, then Izuru could wear that expression as long as he wanted to.

They didn't have to look too far. Just after they stepped only a few steps forward, there was a crash of breaking wood, a loud thud and a stream of vicious curses coming from nearby.

"Abarai?" Momo called. "Are you okay?"

"I'm fine!" he shouted back, then muttered some more curses. "Just landed on a branch. It happened to be a weak one so, uh… oww!"

"Oh, my!" Kira gasped. "I'm starting to think that threes are your natural enemy, Renji!"

"Screw you too!" was the answer. At least now they knew that Renji was okay as well. For someone who fell down from a tree he looked really fine. Kira really wanted to ask if that was because of the long practice Renji had behind his belt, but decided against it. There would be time to pick on Abarai sometime later, preferably in the Academy dorms, where their misadventure would turn into another amusing story of what can go wrong in the work of soul reaper.

"So..." Momo asked, looking around. "You think we are still in the world of the living?"

"Honestly, I have no idea," Izuru shook his head. "I could swear that...whatever it was, it looked like some sort of a portal."

"Can't we check it?" Renji asked, running fingers through his hair, trying to brush away leaves and tiny little twigs and all the other dirt that somewhat got tangled in, during his long way down. The hairband got lost somewhere during the ride and now he was stuck with a mop of unruly, red hair obscuring his vision every few minutes.

"Check it how exactly?" Kira frowned. "We don't have any way of communicating with the Soul Society to confirm our position."

"I can't see any signs of people living around either," Momo sighed. "Maybe if we walk some more..."

"No, wait!" Renji said. "Don't you remember? The lesson about the Spirit Ribbons?"

"How in the world this is even connected to our-" Kira started with annoyance, but then stopped himself, blinking. "Oh!"

The Spirit Ribbons were a manifestation of spiritual pressure of living beings a shinigami could call upon. Because of the ridiculously high amounts of spiritual energy, they were almost impossible to visualize and use in both Soul Society and the Hueco Mundo. But in the world of the living, it was supposed to be much easier.

"Huh," Kira muttered, toying with the idea. "That actually makes a lot of sense. But... we never done it before."

"No time like now for trying it out," Renji just shrugged.

"I agree," Momo nodded. "There's three of us. at least one should luck out and then we will able to tell that we are either in the world of the living or transported to one of the two other places."

That would be something. A place from where they could start finding themselves and their way home. With a lot of luck, they would stumble across a Ribbon of a real shinigami and they troubles would end…

Momo found a comfortable place on the ground and sat down, breathing deeply. In any different circumstances, she would be enjoying herself greatly. The weather was nice, warm but not too hot and the light breeze was carrying the pleasant smell of nature.

She concentrated on the energy inside of her, still buzzing and bubbling, waiting for the next spell to be cast.

It was supposed to be a ribbon, Momo corrected herself, frowning slightly. Ribbons were not supposed to bubble. She tried to imagine a thin piece of red silk, wrapped around her wrists and body, her own Spiritual Ribbon. Then she carefully reached outside.

Momo could feel presence of both of the boys just next to her and tried to now include them in her mental image. Renji's ribbon slightly brighter in color, because of his fiery character, the cloth bending and moving and wandering around all the time. Kira had a darker one. Matte too, because he hated to be the center of the attention. It wasn't as energetic as Renji's ribbon either. Then, when the image has become stable, Momo reached further. Then she gasped.

"Did you felt that too?!" Renji looked at her with a bewilded expression.

She nodded and then carefully picked one of the odd colored ribbons. "This is so odd!"

The Spirit Ribbon that belonged to a shinigami was supposed to be red. A Spirit Ribbon of any other being was just white. And right now, Hinamori was holding something that definitely wasn't white. Or red.

"It's just me, or there's quite a lot of blue ones?" Renji asked.

"It's not just you," Momo shook her head. "I don't understand!"

"And I feel somewhat left out," Izuru sighed. "But yes, the odd coloring is... unexpected. I never heard of anything like that, not even in the fairytales."

"Fairytales?" Momo blinked.

"There they are usually wrapped around each other or even form a knot," Kira shrugged.

"Aw!" Momo clapped her hands together. "That's so cute!"

"But not helpful," he sighed. "What about the strength of the spiritual pressure around here?"

"The blue ones seems to belong to more powerful people," Momo muttered.

"There's one more ribbon, even weirder than the rest of them," Renji added and pulled said ribbon to prove his words.

Kira fought off the pang of jealousy, because it was neither time or place for such things and instead looked at the thing. Later, when they will be chilling out back home, he definitely will bug the hell out of these two for help, but right now, he didn't really need that skill. Instead he just looked at the presented piece of fabric.

Or rather, he gawked at it. "It's yellow."

"That it is," Momo sighed heavily. "It seems that we still don't know where we are. Because this definitely is no realm of the living!"

"Suck to be us," Renji grimaced. "So, what now? Are we going to sit here, or should we do something?"

"Like what?" Kira bitterly shook his head.

"Like following one of the threats," Abarai shrugged. "There's a chance something like that happened before and somebody, somewhere got the answer how to get us back home."

"Do you really believe it?"

"Well," Renji brushed his hair aside, but the red locks knew better what they wanted to do and returned to dangling in front of his face as soon as he lowered his hand. "If it happened, then it's possible, right?"

"Possible it is," Momo nodded. "Are we going to follow the blue or the yellow one?"

"Yellow?" Renji proposed. "I mean, it's fancy and it stick out like we do among the living, so maybe... besides, it seems to not be that far away."

"You're just lazy, aren't you?" Kira snickered. Then he received nudge to the side as an answer.

After a few short minutes of marching through the forest, Momo and Kira decided to let Renji lead. He seemed to actually know how to move where everything was out there to trip a person and created quite a nice path for them.

"Aren't you two too happy about yourselves?" Renji hissed at them, after another twig smacked him in the face.

"Sorry!" the both chirped, making the redhead groan in annoyance.

He wanted to made a snide remark or something, but the words died before they reached his mouth. There was a sudden rush of movement through the thinning line of the forest, a rustling noise of disturbed leaves that completely broke the harmonic melody of nature around them, followed by a crick–crack noise of wood breaking. Also, someone was screaming like a madman.

All three of them immediately dropped on the ground. Well, Renji and Momo did, both of them well taught by the Rukongai itself, while Kira was just pulled down by both of them. Hinamori, using her small size to its fullest advantages, crawled a bit forward to see better, while they just stayed in place, waiting and listening.

There was a kid, dashing forward like his life depended on it. And it did. Another person followed him a fully grown man wearing forest greens and bronzes, with ridiculously big metal weapon of some sort on his back. He was the one doing all the ruckus, while throwing projectiles at the kid. Brat was trying to get away, doing all sorts of crazy thing to avoid the throwing weapon – whatever it was – but his orange clothes were not doing him any favors, marking him as one, big target.

Renji grunted a curse under his nose and his muscles tensed like he was about to stand up and join the unfair fight.

"Stop!" Kira hissed. "Before we do anything we should-"

Renji wasn't listening to him at all. He was already there, calling the attacker nasty names and generally just being stupid.

"-agree on a tactic," Kira finished the sentence with a heavy sigh.

Momo shook her head. "It seems to be a bit personal, don't you think?"

"What do you mean?"

"The way he rushed out there..." Momo muttered. "I don't think it was just because he don't want to see a kid being hurt."

Once again, it was something she saw in Toshirou and now one of her friends was mirroring the behavior. He was always so pissed when seeing people picking on someone smaller or sticking out, because he was too many times on the receiving end. Renji was from Inuzuri, they both knew that. They also knew it wasn't a place for kids, though Abarai wasn't talking much about his childhood.

"You think he's going to be okay?" Momo asked.

"Have you ever fought against him?"

She blushed. She wanted to and even asked an instructor to be paired with Renji at least once, since Abarai was so big and she had no practice in fighting against high opponents but he refused to do so. The skill difference was too big and there was nothing to gain from one–sided fight, the teacher said. So Momo just observed. He was good and breaking out of the kata at random which messed with his opponents who were expecting something completely different.

Now too, Renji seemed to be comfortable with a sword in his hand, looking down at his enemy like he was something unworthy of his attention.

"Who the hell are you?!" the grey-haired man growled.

"Somebody who's going to kick your ass!" Renji answered with a snicker.

Kira groaned. "He's going overboard with the cool card..."

"Do you even know who are you facing, samurai?" the man snickered.

"No clue," Renji admitted with a shrug.

That made the guy actually stare at Abarai in bewilderment, like he couldn't decide if to take it as a grave offense or just the greatest joke ever.

"You fool!" the man decided that the second option was the better one. "You don't know anything, do you? You samurai, you don't have a slightest chance against a high class shinobi like me?"

"A shinobi...?" Izuru mouthed the word.

Momo chewed on her lip. He wasn't the only one who didn't like the sound of that. Was this man like the Special Forces from the Second Division? It didn't fit at all. While the man was wearing clothes that could probably help him hide among the trees really well, he was also loud and clearly a brawler, standing there and talking his mouths off instead of disappearing somewhere in the shadows to do the job from the hiding. Not that she mind very much. Visible opponent was a much better target.

"Look closely, brat!" The man continued. "This poor fool is going to die, all for you! Unless you want to give me that scroll, of course. Then I'm going to spare your new friend's life…"

The boy gulped, his wide eyes shooting nervous glances between both of the men.

"Hey, asshole!" Abarai shouted. "Stop picking on a kid, it's not going to make you a bigger man!"

"You…" the eyes of the grey–haired man narrowed. "You really have no idea who are you talking to, do you? There's not even a slightest chance you could possibly win against someone like me!"

"Dunno," Renji kept on playing the nonchalant, bored bastard. "Wanna find out?"

With a furious growl the man jumped forward, his hand reaching to one of the holsters he was wearing. One swift movement and the air was filled with sharp objects, each of them heading right towards Renji.

Abarai couldn't stepped aside, not with the kid behind him. So he did the next logical thing – he grabbed the kid and tossed him away, while he himself stepped upwards. He was always bad at using his reiatsu to do anything else besides smacking things, but he still managed to harden the air enough to push himself upwards and jump, right above the shurikens.

The blades bit into the tree with a series of loud thuds. Abarai fell down too, using the force of gravity pushing him down to add more strength into his attack, but when he reached the ground, the shinobi wasn't there anymore.

He flickered just behind the kneeling shinigami, a dark, short knife in his hand, ready to strike. Renji managed to block the blade with his sword. Then, in one swift movement he kicked, trying to trip over his enemy or at least break his balance.

The shinobi wasn't there anymore, once again disappearing out of sight only to appear on the opposite side, ready to strike. This time, Renji was ready. He parred the attack easily and attacked, one hit was followed by another. The first one landed on the middle side of the elbow of his enemy, with enough force to make the man drop his weapon, the second one smashed into his shoulder. The impact turned him around slightly. The third punch was directed at his ear, but the shinobi managed to jump away before Renji's fist connected with his head.

He tsked with a nasty grimace on his face. His left hand twitched slightly, but the man fought back the instinct to grab his other hand. It probably hurt like hell. Renji was great when it came to hakuda and his natural strength only made him even more dangerous opponent to face.

Abarai stood up, zanpakutou in one hand, the other slightly raised, read to hit his enemy again.

"Don't think you're the real shit because you have a few tricks up your sleeve," the shinobi growled. "That only means I actually have to start fighting more seriously."

"Knock yourself out," Renji said with a snicker. "Whatever you got, it won't be enough!"

Once again the ninja reached to the holster on his leg and pulled out several of the small, star–shaped blades. In an instant all of the eight shurikens were positioned between his fingers, ready to be tossed at any moment.

"You're about to see something special," the ninja said with a nasty smile forming on his face. "And it's going to be the last thing you will ever see! Shadow Blade Art! Wave!"

He tossed all of his weapons at once. Only for the air to be filled with dozens upon dozens of shurikens that couldn't be possibly there. He had no time to draw new weapons, not to mention there was no way to throw them so fast. But they were there, heading right at Renji!

"Shou!" Abarai growled. A strong wave of pure psychical force smashed right into the weapons, smacking them aside and pushing back right at the opponent.

Hinamori gasped. That's why Renji just stood there, he was quietly repeating the incantation to give his kido enough strength to respond to the attack. It was so obvious, anyone after exchanging a few hits with someone like Abarai would fell back to safer, distance attack.

The shinobi knew that too. Before the first of the blades reached him, he disappeared from his position, only to emerge on the opposite side, holding the humongous blade he was carrying on his back.

"Dodge that!"

Abarai cursed and turned around, barely in time to block the weapon with his own sword. The impact of the hit pushed him back a few feet, leaving a visible trace in the grass underneath.

"Kawarimi!"

Before Renji managed to regain his balance, the giant shuriken dissolved into a cloud of smoke.

"What the–" Izuru started, then covered his mouth with hand, biting into thumb. He couldn't cry out for his friend, not in a situation like that where he was supposed to be hidden, but a shriek almost sneaked out of his mouth.

The ninja somehow hid in now vanishing puff of smoke and used it to his advantage to the fullest. He grasped Renji's sword hand, binding it to his own with a thin rope and forcing it down and to the side, blocking shinigami's other hand. And there was another of those dark, short knives gleaming between ninja's fingers.

"Got you!" He shouted with a gleeful smile on his face, the blade already in motion. Even if Abarai managed to somehow block it with his leg, he still would end up wounded…

"Shakkaho!"

An explosion erupted with a thunderous growl, hungrily swallowing everything around and blossoming high into the air. It tossed both men in the opposite sides as if they were but a ragdolls.

The shinobi, taken completely by surprise smashed into a tree and fell down onto the ground, while Renji managed to land on his knee.

"What the–?!" The ninja pushed himself back up. "An exploding tag?! But I never saw it!"

Abarai chuckled darkly. "Sucker!"

"Is he insane?!" Hinamori gasped. She wasn't the only one shocked, Kira fully shared the opinion. Blowing yourself up just to get away from the opponent was a bit much, even for someone like Renji.

"We can't let this go on!" she said quickly. "He is going to get hurt!"

"I don't think we should interfere…" Izuru muttered quietly, looking at Momo with a frown on his face. It wasn't a Hollow but an one on one fight. People were not supposed to join the duels to help their friends, no matter how outmatched they were. It was an ages old practice that Seireitei lived and breathed with. Maybe it was because the art of swordfight was based on the code of honor or maybe it was because living dishonored was much more serious in the case of shinigami, who lived for hundreds of years. It just felt wrong,

"I don't give a crap about his manly honor!" Momo hissed angrily. "I give a crap about him being alive!"

It would be pretty stupid to argue with that statement, Izuru decided. Dying because of pride really seemed like a ridiculously stupid idea, especially in a situation like that.

He narrowed his eyes, carefully scanning the terrain around them to find the best path to join the battle unnoticed by the enemy. A small miracle he hadn't spotted them already with all that ruckus they were making while arguing. But Renji had his full attention. Good.
Carefully and slowly, Izuru moved towards a tree. The branches covered in rich foliage were going to keep him hidden right until the right moment. Not many people, not even among the shinigami, remembered to look up while checking the terrain for an opponent and Izuru planned to explore this fact to the fullest.

Imagine stairs, he reminded himself and set a first step above the ground, slowly but surely ascending into the air, his reiatsu creating an invisible path.

Then, the moment came, introduced by Hinamori's clear, loud voice.

"Restrain!"

xxx

Maybe it was instinct or maybe it was something entirely else, but since the moment Naruto left the class after his failed exam, the young teacher couldn't shake off the feeling of uneasiness. Like something was going to happen at any moment.

He tried to ignore it. It was probably just his heart fighting with the common sense. It really hurt to see Naruto being so down. On the other hand, letting the boy just pass because he liked him - it would be just like sending the boy to his death. Even in the times of peace, shinobi's job was still one of the most dangerous things in the world and Umino would hate himself if he passed a child that was not ready yet.

Iruka promised himself that he will later hunt down Naruto and buy him as much ramen as he wanted and then he would look for a way to get his hands on the exams, so they could go through the question on the theoretical part together.

Still, the bad feeling wasn't leaving him alone. The answer didn't come much later: Naruto stole a scroll filled with Kinjutsu from the Hokage's Tower and ran for it.

"This is impossible!" Umino gasped when he heard the news.

Because it was. Totally, completely crazy. Naruto wouldn't turn on the Village. No matter what, he just cared for this place too much!

The shinobi forces were send to search for the boy and Iruka dashed through the village and then the forests around as well, truly hoping to find the boy first. Just what was in his head?

He wasn't the only one missing. Mizuki was nowhere to be fund too and he was probably the last person who saw Naruto.

Iruka frowned. Was he looking for the kid too? Or was there something else...?

He shook his head. No time for the conspiracy theories!

Umino planned on checking Naruto's usual spots, but then decided against it. Contrary to what other people believed, the boy wasn't stupid. When it came to hiding and sneaking around, Naruto was far, far beyond anything his classmates could pull off, especially when he wanted to not be noticed. So, no, the usual spots – the top of the Hokage Monument, the trees near the playground, that training ground close to the Uchiha's corner of the village where the little pond was… they all were just a waste of time. Besides, other shinobi definitely covered all of these places anyway.

What Umino needed, was something different. Unexpected. Though the whole situation was unexpected on the border with surreal, because Naruto wouldn't ever…

What if it was something else? Iruka gave up on logic and just let his instinct choose the path, while cursing his lack of sensory ability. He was always jealous about that particular thing and now, more than ever.

Oddly enough, the instinct was all he needed. It led him through the forest, closer and closer to the wide, grassy terrains that were not far from the Valley of the End, when he found what he was looking for.

Mizuki was on the ground, battered and beaten but still clearly alive. Two men were standing next to him, pinning him to the ground with the legs on his backs, while their long swords crossed right above the back of Mizuki's next.

Naruto - and that blasted scroll - was several meters away, sitting with his back by one of the trees, while a third swordsman was standing next to him.

"Umino!" Mizuki was the first one to notice them. "You must help me! They want to take the scroll!"

"Say what now...?" the highest one tilted his head looking at his hostage, long, red hair obscured his face.

Both he and his partner were wearing exactly the same sort of clothing - an uniform, perhaps - and were good enough to beat a Chuunin. It also looked like only the big one was fighting, Iruka could see the same scorching and burn marks on Mizuki.

"Don't listen to him!" Naruto screamed, scrambling onto his feet. "He's lying!"

"Naruto!" Mizuki growled. "You are already in trouble! We can ignore the pranking, but this one was too much! you stole that scroll and I followed you all the way here! Was hoping to drag you and the scroll back before something bad happen, but then-"

"That was my lie, you asshole!"

Iruka's eyebrow twitched. "Where did you learn that word?"

The boy pointed at the redhead samurai without skipping a beat.

"Hey!" the man protested.

"Rright..." Umino sighed. "Naruto, explain yourself, now."

Priorities, priorities. He probably should deal with the attackers first and foremost, because they dared to not only raise a hand on Konoha shinobi, but were still standing on him while still being on Konoha territory, but... something just didn't fit in the story.

Sure, Naruto was a prankster and both he and Mizuki chased the kid more times than Iruka cared to remember, but it was never something like that.

There was also the other thing - Naruto didn't seem to be afraid of the samurai group at all, even with one of them standing right by him, ready to draw a sword any moment now. It was a girl and a short one too, so she didn't seem like too much of a threat. However in a shinobi world everyone with a weapon was dangerous no matter how they looked like and it was a lesson Umino was repeating over and over again. Everyone in the class was able to recite it by now.

But no, the samurai trio was not considered as a danger of any sort. Naruto actually seemed to be already pretty jovial with the big guy!

"He told me to!" Naruto sniffed. "He told me that it was a super special exam and if I pass I still could be a Genin!"

"Mizuki asked you to steal the-!" Umino choked on the last word.

"I-I know it was stupid, I shouldn't do that, but I really wanted..." Naruto continued his story, choking on his tears. "And then I told him we still can go back and I would just tell people it was a prank so Mizuki wouldn't have to run or anything!"

"From our perspective," the blonde samurai said, his voice quiet and neutral."This man wanted the scroll enough to try and use one of us as a bargaining tool against the boy."

Umino eyes widened slightly. Holding a knife against someone's throat definitely was making the situation much more personal for the mysterious trio.

ANBU definitely was going to show up here at any moment now; heck someone might be already in the shadows, observing them, but not reacting for reasons unknown. He needed to wrap it all up quickly and decide who was telling the truth: a kid on a pranking spree, currently scared out of his wits and hiccupping violently, or a comrade in arms, a person who was his friend for long, long years.

Umino carefully breathed in, trying to take in the surroundings all at once, drinking up all the details. There were shurikens sticking out of the ground and threes around, many of them in all too familiar lines of three, Mizuki's favorite throwing trick. He was always very good with projectiles and these had to belong to him - Naruto hadn't even a kunai on him, that was easy to tell. What Naruto had, was a blood stain on his trousers. It had to be quite deep, enough to drip down to the sandal and leave rusty imprints around his toes and creep under the nails.

Naruto's clothes were torn here and there, the holes clearly made with something sharp. Arms, legs... someone didn't want to kill him, but definitely had nothing against hurting him either. It was about reducing the mobility, Iruka decided with a frown.

"He said," Naruto sniffed. "That he had to deliver the scroll somewhere. And me too!"

"Why?" Iruka asked. "Mizuki, why?"

"What?!" the other shinobi gasped. "You trust that little demon brat over me?! Your comrade? I through... I thought we were friends, Iruka!"

"Watch out for your words," Iruka warned him. It was too close to dropping an S-class secret among the strangers for his comfort. "But yes, I through that too. However, Naruto would never come up with a plan of stealing this particular scroll if someone didn't plant the idea in his mind."

It was still a pretty neat plan, using a disliked person with a knack for pranking as a scapegoat. Many people would buy it without a second thought. Placing himself as a hero that was chasing after the thief and then just disappearing, never coming back home. Someone would surely try to place a blame on the secret Naruto held inside of him. Someone surely would say thing about losing control and the beast taking over and devouring the poor Chunin.

"Why don't you believe me?!"

"You attacked Naruto," Iruka stated coldly. "He's all battered up, but the scroll is fine. Meaning, he was protecting it. And since you're the only person around here who prefer to use projectiles, he was protecting it from you."

"You...!" Mizuki growled i fury, trying to shake the samurai off his back.

The redhead almost immediately shifted his weight, pinning the Chunin to the ground much harder than before. "Dude, if you keep that your you're going to slit your own throat!"

Iruka could sweat there was more than an ounce of panic in it. Whoever these people were, killing definitely wasn't in their intention, no matter how sharp their swords were.

"Mizuki, why?" Umino asked, not quite able to get rid of the pain from his voice. "Why would you do something like that?"

"Seriously?" the man snorted. "You are asking me why? With that thing standing right next to you?"

"Mizuki!" Iruka hissed a warning through his teeth.

And was completely ignored.

"Why do you even care?" the ninja continued, chuckling bitterly. "That thing… it's not even a boy, it's just a de–"

He never finished that sentence. Suddenly, the two swordsmen who were keeping Mizuki pinned to the ground were standing a few steps away completely startled, while their place was taken by ANBU. One of them, a broad muscular man wearing a mask stylized to look like a boar stepped on the back of Mizuki's neck, pushing him into the ground hard enough to cut the sentence in half and make breathing to difficult to talk anymore.

Several more ANBU appeared around them. One of them picked up the scroll and patted Naruto on his head, though using enough force to make it look like a small smack instead. The boy only grinned.

"We are taking it from here," the Boar said.

Iruka breathed out with relief. It was a close call and it definitely wasn't the end of it. Questions were going to happen and they were going to happen soon, both from the ANBU – or even the T&I specialists – and from Naruto and Umino wasn't quite sure which one he dreaded more.

It took only a few moments for the ANBU to pick Mizuki from the ground, restrain him and then drag him back to the village. It was almost surreal, at least from Iruka's point of view. Just this very morning, Mizuki was his close friend and they swapped bad joked between the classes and talked a little about progress – or lack of it – of the students they shared. And now…

The whole situation definitely looked even weirder for the outsiders, at least considering the expressions the samurai trio were making.

"We are grateful for your assistance," Boar said, bowing slightly towards the swordsmen. "We would also like to hear about what had happened here from your point of view if it isn't too troubling. If you please follow us…"

Considering the glances they exchanged, the samurai were perfectly able to read between the lines and caught on the unmentioned "or else" part of the whole thing.

The blond one mouthed something Iruka didn't managed to understand and the big one just shrugged. The girl was the only one visibly nervous among them, her gaze following the masked shinobi.

In the end, they decided to follow without making a fuss, which was quite a relief. Iruka definitely had enough of excitement for today. Oddly enough, Naruto seemed to share his opinion. He wasn't all over the place like his usual self. Though it could be because he was fascinated by the guests slash intruders slash saviors. Or at least the redhaired one, because the guy was cheerfully talking with Naruto. And he wasn't censoring himself.

There, Iruka decided as he heard another vulgarity slipping out like it was nothing, was going to be a very serious talk as soon as the Hokage decided what he was going to do with this whole mess.