Chapter twelve…
Whoa, I'm nearly at the end of the first game! The third letter is from the original story.
Anyway, suggestions are welcome!
I don't own Umineko or Naruto!
Kakashi looked at Tenten with wild surprise.
"Tenten! Calm down!" He said, not getting too close. He knew that he too was skilled with shuriken and kunai, but not to her degree, besides, he wouldn't attack a comrade. Plus, everyone might start believing that he was the culprit.
"Tenten…" Hanabi said, her voice neither sad nor afraid. "Look behind you."
Tenten turned, but making sure she was always aware of the people behind her, and gasped. The portrait of Beatrice was hanging on the wall behind her. It was smaller, but identical in every other way. Also, the plaque on which the epitaph was written was nailed to the wall underneath it.
"That wasn't there when we came in." Deidara murmured, his eyes fixed on the golden writing. Suddenly, a look of realisation crossed his face.
"Look at the epitaph, what it says." He said. After a minute or two, the faces around the room began to mirror his.
He looked around before he continued:
"The murders…they are happening in accordance with the script…the six sacrifices at the beginning, and then…"
"The remaining tearing apart the two who were close…Pein and Konan." Kakashi intoned, reading ahead.
"I think it's time I admitted to something…" Shikamaru said. All eyes turned to him, and Tenten trained her shuriken closely on him. He drew an envelope out of his pocket, just like the one on the table that was now in Deidara's hands (he had leant forward and picked it up).
"What is it?" Spat Tenten venomously.
"When we went down to the boiler room, there was this letter in the doorframe. I picked it up and read it, but it didn't seem important so I didn't tell you…"
"That makes you twice as likely to have been the one to place the third letter on the table!" Tenten shouted, tensing her arms.
"Tenten." Kakashi said quickly, with a look of impatience at her. "Shikamaru, what does it say?" He asked, looking at the letter in his hand. Shikamaru opened the envelope and drew out the paper
"Glorify in my name." He said.
"Is that all?" Hidan asked, sounding disappointed. Shikamaru nodded.
"But that is important!" Deidara said, as he pointed at one of the lines in the epitaph.
"At the third twilight, the surviving shall praise my honorable name on high." Deidara read. "Se, it all fits. Whether the murderer is a witch or not is unimportant. What's important is that we know the murderer if killing according to the inscription!"
"So then, the fourth and fifth twilights were refering to sasori and Tobi?" Neji asked.
"Exactly." Kakashi replied.
"But that means that at least three more people have to die, according to the epitaph!" Tenten said, looking back at the four on the other side of the room.
"No…look closer 'At the ninth twilight, the Witch shall be revived and none shall be left alive'." Deidara said quietly.
"Does that mean that we are all going to be killed?" Asked Tenten, her eyes widened.
"Kihihihi! It doesn't matter if all of us have to die!" Hanabi said, a sinister smile on her face, made all the more unerving on one so young. "We all get to go to the golden land in the end, just like it says!"
Tenten's face contorted in anger.
"Of course it matters! There can't be a golden land. Those people – our friends shouldn't have to die for this….fairytale!" She hissed.
"I…agree." Deidara said, looking at Hanabi with a face full of dislike.
"Ah, but don't you see?" Hanabi giggled, "When Beatrice is revived, she will give us treasures that include the lives of all the dead, and a lost love…kihihi!"
"Just shut up!" Tenten yelled, raising her hands full of shuriken once more. "I've had it with this. Deidara? Could you read the third letter to us, then we can decide what to do with these four, as none of them will admit to placing it there!"
Hidan looked on with surprise as Deidara nodded and opened the envelope, drawing out the creamy paper.
"Have you been enjoying the riddle of my master's epitaph? There isn't much time left for any of you. Please abandon any naïve about being able to escape when the storm passes. This game can only end with me or the rest of you winning. When your time runs out, it'll be my victory. I ask you not to misunderstand this situation."
"There's also some kind of scribble on the back of the paper, like the one on the door to the storehouse." Deidara added.
Tenten's gaze became murderous.
"So, who of you put it there? Come on, all of you should have seen! The fact that none of you are telling me means you are all working together!" She snarled.
"It wasn't us!" hanabi said, her hands balled into fists.
"Hanabi…did you see Beatrice again? Was it her?" Kakashi asked quietly.
"I thought none of you belived in Beatrice?" Hanabi said with a sick smile.
"If you won't tell me who put down that letter on the table, I will make all of you leave this room." Tenten said, very quietly, but they could hear the threat in her tone.
"Tenten…" Deidara began.
"If you won't tell us, then it means all four of you are culprits!" She continued, ignoring Deidara.
Kakuzu closed his eyes, and put up his hands. Without chakra, he couldn't harden his skin or use his black threads, so had to adm,it he was in a no-win situation.
"We understand," Shikamaru said with a sigh. "If you believe so strongly that it was us, we will leave the room."
"Wait!" Tenten said as they turned to leave. "Give us the keys that you possess first."
Kakuzu sighed, and dropped three ornate keys on the table. One was his, one had been Sasori's, and the last had belonged to Pein. The four of them walked to the doorway, Hidan grumbling, and Hanabi last.
"Hanabi!" Neji called after her.
They could hear her twisted laugh as she continued to walk away.
"Don't worry, cousin." She said, "The door to the golden land will be opened very soon, and then all of the dead shall be revived."
She turned, her smile truly too wide.
"We will all be happy." She said.
The metal shuriken clinked together in Tenten's hands.
"Now get out, or I'll thorw these!"
The turned to go, but Kakashi stepped forward.
"Wait," she said, as he dropped something into Hanabi's hand. It was the chram she had given him. Hanabi, Shikamaru, Hidan and Kakuzu left the room, closing the door with a click behind them.
After a while, Neji looked at Tenten, his eyes cold.
"If one of the four is innocent, then you've just put them in great danger, Tenten." He said.
"In which case, I have sacrifised one in order to make sure the rest of us survive." She said, without looking at him.
"I'm interested in the drawing you said was on the back of the paper." Kakashi said, taking the letter from Deidara, he smoothed it out on the table infront of them.
"Hey, I saw that one in one of these books!" Said Deidara eagerly, as he retrived one of the old volumes from the pile next to him and found the right page. He was right, the two were identical.
"Dammit, the writing is all in Latin again…" He growled fustratedly.
"wait a moment, I found a book over here that could translate that…" Said Neji as he too brought a book over. He took a pencil from the poy on the table, and set about translating the writing that accompanied the darwing.
"What does it say?" tenten asked, leaning over to have a closer look.
"Discord. Fan up internal divisions and make the enemy destroy themselves." Neji read.
"What a minute!" Deidara said, his eyes widening, "Then, wasn't that letter just a trap?"
"If so, we did exactly what the murderer wanted…" Replied Kakashi.
Tenten remained silent.
Suddenly, the old telephone in the corner of the room began to ring.
The four looked at it, and for the first time since the start of the incidence, all of them looked truly afraid.
Kakashi walked over to it, and picked it up.
"Hello?" He asked.
