Title: Seven Children, Seven Barns
Fandom: Naruto
Characters: Gai, Lee, Anko, Kakashi
Story collection: Bits and Pieces: Horror Edition
Word count: 897
Warnings: talks of: Death, child homicide, suicide
Urban Legend: The 7th Barn
AN: Just a couple more left for this time.
"Dad, are you sure that you have the right place?" Gai beamed at his son, reaching over to ruffle black hair. When he had taken a chance to move his family to America using his own dual citizenship for it, he had been worried about their future. But the university teaching job had been just the thing he needed to get his book writing back into gear he found. He taught four days a week, had open office hours all day during day five, and spent the weekend either writing or spending time with his son, Lee, and wife, Anko.
The small family had piled into their car and drove six hours to the town where Gai was sure that the barns he was researching were. Anko had decided to stay back at the hotel while her son and husband left to scope the place out before it got too late. He was sure he had the right barns and just needed to gather pictures for himself from the barns.
"I'm sure. If you look at the pictures that I found, the barns all have nameplates. All those names are of children who had disappeared and who had been in one family," Gai said. "The legend goes that there were seven barns for seven children. The last child unfortunately didn't make it, and neither did the wife, both dying in childbirth."
Lee pursed his lips as he pulled out a small reading light, keeping it close to the matte pictures that he pulled out of his father's back pack. "So…the seventh barn was never officially named?" he asked.
"Supposedly not. The farm started to go under because the father didn't do the needed work for it's upkeep. It is said that he went insane from his grief," Gai continued, eyes lighting up at the fact that his son was so interested. While Gai's interest laid in history and Anko's interest laid in anything that was cold blooded, Lee was more into sports and martial arts. To see him so interested in a legend, no matter how old and improbable it was, was nice.
"What happened? To the kids that is. You said that the names matched up to six who disappeared from the same family," Lee said. He continued to look at the pictures, each one a barn with nameplates on them.
"The legend says that the father took them out one night, killed them all, and buried them in their own barns nearly a year after he lost his last child and wife. He hung himself in the seventh barn actually," Gai said as he drove carefully up to a large barn. "And here's lucky number seven." He beamed brightly with his child and the two got out of the car. "Let us take pictures then we'll return to the hotel, get a good nights' sleep and come back in the daytime!"
"Right!" Lee cheered, grabbing his camera while his father did the same, the two heading into the barn.
The next morning, Anko woke up to the other side of the bed being empty, her husband not there, and the cot for their child empty. After a quick call to the front desk and learning that her son and husband hadn't been seen that night, she called the police and told them where they had been heading out to.
Three hours later, a police officer delivered the news, handing over the cameras and the notes that they had recovered from the car.
"Why…? How?" Anko gasped, crying as she clung to the cameras.
"I don't know. I can tell you that they were recording when it happened, but the cameras didn't pick anything up. They just turned to static," Kakashi said, sitting before her. He pressed his lips together. "I'm guessing that your husband had heard the legend of the seven barn and traced it back to our six right?" he asked.
"Ah…yes. He did. Why?" Anko asked, wiping at her nose before blowing it into two of the cheap hotel tissues.
"We don't advertise it…but that legend has a lot of truth to it. The father did kill his kids, but they weren't buried under the barns. He did end up hanging himself in one of the barns and the land was sold off by his brother afterwards. Those who bought the land kept the barns, refurbished them in some cases. They still stand. And the seventh one does to. The land around it was given to the city as a hiking area," Kakashi said.
Anko stared at him with wide eyes. He rubbed at his face, not wanting to talk about his towns weirdness.
"There's talk around town that if you go out there at night, you'll see him hanging from the rafters. No one dares to go out to that barn at night. Especially since there have been a few deaths out there that we couldn't really call suicide," Kakashi continued. He stood up. "Their deaths? Won't ever be solved. Not unless we get real lucky, they're likely to become a cold case."
"Why?" Anko asked, standing with him.
Kakashi paused by the hotel room door and gazed at her with a solemn look on his face. "I hate to say it, but there is no way to put 'death by cursed barn and ghost' on a death certificate."