Chapter Text
“Aah! Miles! It’s Mr. Wright!!”
Defense Attorney Miles Edgeworth turned and blinked.
Prosecutor Phoenix Wright glared back at him.
“What do you wanna be when you grow up Phoenix?” The young spiky haired boy looked up from the pattern he was tracing with a stick in the park’s dirt pathways. Miles privately thought it was a bit of a silly question, he was nine years old but didn’t act like it, yet this was such a nine-year-old question to ask. Besides, he already had it planned out. But this was a question he had directed towards Phoenix, not himself.
They both stopped walking for a moment. Phoenix smiled back at him, his tongue pushing at his top loose right incisor.
“Well, I’ve been thinking about it-”
“That’s never good.”
“Hey!” They both laughed a little before Phoenix continued. “I’ve been thinking about it,” they started walking again his best friend idly dragging his stick behind him, leaving a solid line in the dirt. “I wanna be an artist. And a defense attorney! Like you! An artistic defense attorney! A defense attorney who’s an artist!”
Miles had a hopeful little smile on his face. “We could be partners in crime, Phoenix.” He whispered, still smiling.
“You mean partners in fighting crime, right?”
“Yes, of course, what else would I mean?”
The first time Miles heard that his friend’s mother was dead was devastating news. He’d known Miss Wright. Eaten meals she’d cooked.
He’d sobbed into his father’s chest, his hands clutching at his father’s shirt so tightly they hurt. The whole time he kept repeating the same question over and over again.
“What’s gonna happen to Phoenix?”
His father fought legally for Phoenix Wright. But. It was too late. Much too late. And Phoenix Wright was swept up by Manfred Von Karma much too fast.
And what had remained of Phoenix Wright rose The Manic Prosecutor.
He’d been in college at the time when he’d first heard the title given to his friend by the press.
Apparently, he gained the title for two reasons. One was for being a ruthless prosecutor, and the other was for at some point in one of his first trials he’d jumped onto the prosecution’s bench and proceeded to stand on it.
Ridiculous.
Utterly Ridiculous.
Miles had hoped he’d never see such a thing until- well-
“Mr. Wright Please step down from-”
“I request that the witness testify again,”
“Well, then what do you want the witness to testify about?”
“I...obviously want her to testify about, yunno- After they found the body!”
“...”
“...”
“Are you going to step down, Mr. Wright?”
“Ah, yes. I suppose so.”
The man was nothing like the boy he knew. Not even in appearance. Wright’s suit was bright blue paired with a purple waistcoat. There was also the ascot-like red cravat. His heterochromia eyes were as dazzling as they were as a child. The left, ever a warm brown, the right, always a sharp blue. The only thing Miles couldn’t figure out were those damn green colored sunglasses. The green lenses obstructed the man’s eyes.
Then there was his strict formal behavior that he had, until he, well didn’t. He was a proper stuck up gentleman. And then, he went into dangerously, almost silly behavior. Manic indeed. Elegant words turned into more common slang. Miles had always been the more proper one. Yet he always managed to be more than Phoenix Wright was. Masks are all that Phoenix wore it seemed. Masks upon Masks.
Wright looked through his emerald colored lenses, eyes scanning Miles’ face. He didn’t seem like he was going to initiate the conversation. At all. So, Miles let out a small sigh and said,
“Are you going to say something, Wright? I’ve been told that I'm not good at small talk.”
Miles tilted his head to the side, squinting at the man before him, searching for a sign of the boy he once knew. It wasn’t often the Prosecutor was this close to him, often separated across the courtroom of course.
Wright said nothing, only casting his eyes to the side, adjusting his glasses with something that might have been nervousness. It was a fruitless adjustment, of course, nothing to be gained when his glasses were already as far as they could go up his nose.
Miles silently clicked his teeth together, fully aware that if he didn’t say something, this conversation was going to be silence for another two hours. “Err. I’m sorry about the trial…? But-”
Wright raised an eyebrow, “Boasting already, that’s a bit of a shocker. I always took you for someone more humble than that.”
There was a challenge in his eyes.
Miles sighed, before giving Wright what he hoped was a warm smiled, inviting even, maybe.
“Actually, No... I really wanted to thank you. Vasquez...she would have gotten away if you hadn't stepped in.” Another awkward pause, as Wright let his thousand-yard stare take over. As the prosecutor seemed to refuse his gaze, Miles sighed, a million questions running through his mind, but none of them standing out. A thousand questions, but none of them are asked.
Miles jumped as Powers’ stuck out his large hand in the middle of the conversation. “Ah, uh, pleased to meet you. I'm Will Powers.” A large sniff followed, Miles hoped he wouldn’t start crying just because Wright was talking to them...
Wright had the decency to look shocked at the very least, the closet shoulder leaning away from the man. He seemed to steel himself for a moment, before saying,
“Right, Uhm, Wright...Wright. Ha...um, I can’t say I’ve watched much of your show Mr. Powers, but I must say, heh. The soundtrack is...real... classy. ”
( what. )
Another pause before Wright finally looked back to him, a glowering look in fact. What a delight to be featured at the end of one.
“Edgeworth. This, well, I can’t say I hadn’t expected to meet you again after all these years. But I thought you knew better and would stay away.” That was a huge disappointment. It was like a blow to the chest. It hurt. That had to be a lie. Right? Wright ?
“Meet "again"...?” Maya’s small voice leaked into the conversation, whether meant to be said aloud or not. Though Miles couldn’t even bear to bring his eyes away from the man before him, yet his hand did still manage to find it’s way up to his elbow, clutching it like a lifeline.
Wright let out what might’ve just been a breathless laugh. He turned his head to the side intent on studying the wall next to them. “Yet.. in, uh, retrospect, it would have been better had we not met. Thanks to you, I have a lot of...unwarranted feelings. Ones I could stand to live without”
Despite the stress Miles blushed, there was no way that that was what Wright meant. “Unwarranted feelings?” A blush crawled across his face as he asked.
“Yeah. Unease... and uncertainty…” Still staring at the wall, still just as solemn. The blush disappeared quickly, replaced by a streak of confusion.
“Aren’t those, kind of a requirement ? Everyone has them, after all, they’re kind of....warranted ” If there was a form to opt out of certain emotions he’d sure like to know.
His head turned sharply to face him, distress written on his features. “They are only obstacles to get in my way. Miles Edgeworth, I’ve got something to say, well- Don't ever show your face in front of me again! That's-that’s what I came here to tell you.”
With that, Prosecutor Phoenix Wright adjusted his coat, with, one could say was a flare of dramatics; practically going as fast as one could while walking down the hall.
And left Defense Attorney Miles Edgeworth Standing Alone.
But that trembling in his words had shown that the boy he had known was still there. He was going to save Phoenix Wright even if Phoenix Wright didn’t even know he needed saving.