"The wolf, he howls
The lion does roar
The wolf lets him in"

(Conference)

Italy and Germany exchanged nervous glances throughout the entire meeting. Italy obviously hadn't squealed about the whole "Germany trying to kill him" thing, so that was good. But what about after the meeting?

As the meeting began drawing to a close, Germany excused himself early to avoid confronting Italy. He made his way to conference room 11 to clear his head. As he was walking down the hallway, he noticed England walking ahead of him.

'I hadn't noticed he had left... I was so wrapped up with Italy, I hadn't been paying attention. Come to think of it, didn't England excuse himself early yesterday too?' Germany thought to himself.

He picked up his speed slightly to catch up with England- or at least see where he was going. He was just about to turn down the hallway which led to conference room 11, when someone short bumped into him.

Immediately, Germany realized from the black cloak he wore that he was one of the hooded figures- but he'd never seen one without their hood before... It was a young boy with blue eyes and pale blonde hair. He looked vaguely familiar...

The boy panicked and ran past Germany into the conference room 18. He considered going after him, but the meeting was almost over- going back there would mean confronting Italy... So he shrugged it off and continued towards conference room 11.

Much to Germany's surprise, when he opened the door he ran into not one, but two hooded figures- both with their hoods up.

"Wait... there are two of you?"

Italy yawned quietly- vaguely trying to pay attention to the last few minutes of the meeting but also having not gotten enough sleep the previous night. Nightmares as usual...

America was wrapping up his speech- which happened to be the last speech of the day- and a few nations were already excusing themselves, not really wanting to listen to the benefits of making doughnut day an international holiday.

England and Germany had left what seemed like ages ago- and without them the conference room was beginning to fall into chaos. The nations who hadn't left were talking amongst themselves as America desperately tried to draw their attention back to him- only prolonging how long they would have to sit there.

Italy even considered excusing himself to go and find Germany... They had some things to talk about- or at the very least to sort out... Italy looked up at the door only to see Holy Roman Empire come running in. Italy glance around to see if anyone else saw him, but no one seemed to notice.

Holy Rome tugged lightly on Italy's uniform before handing him a tiny painting of a flower and disappearing out the door once more. The painting was so little that it easily fit in Italy's hand. He flipped it over.

"Wait... there are two of you?"

The figures stood in silence as if in shock. Apparently they hadn't been expecting Germany to visit. The green-eyed figured looked to the purple-eyed one with a silent question- or perhaps a plea- in the glance.

"What are you doing here, Germany?" the purple-eyed one asked in a serious tone.

"Avoiding Italy..." Germany muttered. The figured heard but remained silent for a moment.

"It is unimportant..." the green-eyed figure said carefully, "Remember the watch."

"What about it?" Germany asked. No reply. "How is it supposed to do me any good if I don't understand what it means?"

"It'll do you good once you figure it out. Remember, only one has to die- so choose wisely."

"Do you mean- Does that mean I don't have to kill Italy?" Germany asked hopefully. Purple-eyes shot green-eyes a glance.

"You tell me," the green-eyed figure said, pointing to the watch.

(Manor)

Germany fiddled with the watch some. He was no closer to figuring out what his dream had meant, but he felt as though if he just kept staring at the blasted thing he'd come to some sort of enlightenment about the whole situation.

Germany sighed loudly and set the watch aside, replacing it with a pad of paper and a pen as he scribbled down the numbers and the words corresponding to them.

"37, 21- Fated; 18, 11- Threatened; 12, 73- Dead; 11, 81- Pawns"

It was obvious that some of the numbers were reversed of other numbers, 18 and 81 for example. In fact each number had a reverse- sitting opposite of it on the clock- except for 11. Well, of course the reverse for 11 is still 11, but it was still somewhat out of place.

Germany sighed- or rather grunted- and set the piece of paper aside, picking up the watch again. There was something he should do- assuming he didn't get killed trying to do it...

"Italy?" Germany knocked on room #337, no reply. "Italy, I know you're in there... Come on, I just want to talk- I'm not even armed," Germany realized suddenly out loud... Maybe he should have been...

Suddenly the door flew open and Italy jumped on him with a crazed look in his eyes. Germany dodged the attack and the two of them just stared at each other.

"...Italy?" Germany asked concerned. Italy didn't respond verbally, but he clutched his knife a little tighter. Germany put his hand out defensively as he reached for the watch in his pocket. Italy watched each move carefully.

Germany held the watch out to Italy, taking a slow step forward as if he were approaching a wounded animal.

"I think you should take a look at this. I don't know what it is, but I think it pertains to... this situation we're in," Germany said, choosing his words carefully as to not directly say what it was in case the figures weren't lying about everyone dying if he told anyone.

Germany took a cautious step forward, now just close enough for Italy to take the watch. Which of course, was not what he did. Instead Italy slashed Germany's hand with the knife causing him to recoil back just long enough for Italy to snatch up the watch and run down the hallway.

"The lion runs in through the door
The real fun begins
As they both rush upon you and
Rip open your flesh
The lion eats his fill and then
The wolf cleans up the mess"

Germany walked down to the main hall of the manor- his hand now bandaged up- with his written copy of the watch in his pocket. He rang the bell at the front desk for service. Shortly the old woman who ran the place arrived.

"Yeesssss?" the woman said, slowly drawing out the question.

"I need to know who is in these rooms," Germany said, pulling out a piece of paper, "121, 137, 227, 321, 173-"

"Noooow, noooow, son," the woman interrupted him slowly, "I'm afraaaid, I caaaaan't doooo thaaaaaaaaaaaaat..."

"Vhy not?" Germany asked, quicker than necessary, but what do you expect? That woman takes forever to answer a simple question!

"Priiiiivaaaacyyyyy,"

"But I need to know!"

"AllYouNeedToKnowIsWhoTrustsYouTheMost," the words came out of the woman's mouth so quickly that Germany wasn't even sure she'd said them. After a moment he shook his head and thanked the woman- even though she really didn't help him.

"The lion's outside of your door
The wolf's in your bed"

Having to go room to room in order to figure out who was in each of the "marked" rooms was a pain. But since the old woman wasn't any help, Germany had no choice. He marked down each person's name next to their room number and then continued on to the next.

"(Fated) 121- Greece, 137- Turkey, 221- Germany, 237- Iceland, 321- Norway, 337- Italy."

"(Dead) 112- Prussia, 173- Austria, 212- Japan, 273- Spain, 312- Hungary, 373- Romano."

"(Pawns) 111A- America, 111B- Canada, 181- China, 211- Russia, 281- Denmark, 311- Belarus, 381- England and Sealand."

"(Threatened) 111A- America, 111B- Canada, 118- France, 211- Russia, 218- Ukraine, 311- Belarus, 318- Sweden and Finland."

Germany was just finishing up the third floor- it had taken him most of the night, but he now knew all the room numbers in the manor that matched the numbers on the watch. He had just one room to go, and then he'd be done.

But as Germany reached to knock on the door, he felt a chill go up his spine. He looked behind him as if he were expecting someone to be there, watching him. He quickly dissmissed the feeling and knocked on the door- perhaps a bit too forcefully, as the '3' on the door number fell off, leaving just the '81'.

England opened the door with Sealand playing- or whatever it is kids do- in the background. England looked surprised to see him there, and stumbled over his words for a moment before saying,

"Oh, Germany, I wasn't expecting you to drop by. Erm, was there something you wanted to talk about?"

Meanwhile, Germany's mind was racing- at least he'd finally figured out what 81 meant...

((HAHA! Cliffhanger! Sort of. You may or may not have actually figured out what 81 means, but Germany has! And if you haven't, then you'll have to wait until the next chapter to find out! MWAHHAHAHAHAHAHA!))