Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

December 27, 2017

Berry Big Circus

Pearl was still jumping as they got out of the circus, getting Phoenix to smile as Maya also jumped for joy. Despite seeing Maya as the Master of Kurain, helping those and working to get her village back in order, it was good to see her also act like the Maya he’d come to know, someone who could be serious as well as childish and happy.

It was also good to see that Pearl was having fun. She’d been unhappy for most of the summer and into the fall, meaning that he’d spent most of his time in Kurain, helping Maya and Pearl with whatever they needed. Maya had drawn up the official papers and they’d had to go into the city to put them in. That had meant, unluckily, that Maya had to deal with Lisbeth D’Arcy and her lawyers.

Phoenix stopped thinking about the memory of it, because he wanted to focus on the positive. Even with the pills still holding his powers in check, the circus had been great to go to, and the energy from it, even with some of the weaker acts, nearly had him jumping for joy as well.

“Why are the circus performers wearing those weird pins?” Pearl finally asked, getting Phoenix to frown. Pearl’s own pin, of a homeschooled lineage, was one that only showed how powerful she was, and Maya’s similar pin had gotten them good seats. Phoenix hadn’t been questioned about his arrival with them - his pin now included a green jade gemstone, which signaled that he was declared to whichever high-powered person he was with.

“Because they’re magi,” Maya said, looking thoughtful as she continued, “most circus performers are.”

“Mad-jai?”

“It’s a term they took up,” Phoenix tells her simply, “because a lot of them are performers who don’t want to belong. They don’t wear pins, but instead wear something identifying who they’re with. Some don’t wear pins at all, but tattoos or something similar.”

Pearl blinked, looking surprised. “Really?”

“Yeah,” Phoenix said, smiling as he said, “My grandmother was a magi.”

Both Maya and Pearls looked at him in surprise as he smiled at them. He hadn’t known Amalthea Wright, but he’d found her things and seen photos of her. The magi pin she’d worn, that of a unicorn with its hair as a wave, was from a disbanded group, but he also knew they and many nulls and low-levels traveled, especially during the depression, together. The story of her helping his grandfather Lír was one he knew well, and was up for telling the overly-curious Pearl and Maya on their way back to Kurain.

“What’d she do? What’d she do?” Pearls asked as they walked off, the happy feeling still making Phoenix feel happy as well, despite his exhaustion that he simply can’t shake. He knows what it means, but he wants to focus on Pearls and Maya instead of on that.

“She rode horses bareback,” he told her, “and did tricks, like jump over hoops and land back on the horses without falling off, or dance with them, or just have them move in a way horses normally don’t.”

“What about your grandfather?” Maya asked.

“He did odd jobs,” Phoenix said, “He never really became a magi, just was traveling around during the depression, trying to find a job. One day, he jumped into a train car and found himself in with the horses and with grandma. She needed help with one and he helped her out, and then stayed, helping out around the circus. Finally, he asked her to marry him. She said she would if they moved and had a permanent home, with a place where she could see the forest.”

Pearls had that dreamy look in her eyes, the kind she got when she thought Maya and he were having a ‘moment’. Phoenix had stopped attempting to tell the girl that he only saw Maya as a friend, and that he didn’t want her to suffer like everyone else had suffered because of him. It was good enough to be safe from Lisbeth D’Arcy and her group, even if it meant that Gavin still talked to him like he was an idiot and didn’t see the ‘truth’. Gavin hadn’t taken the official mark well, and seemed unhappy that Phoenix would go back to Maya when she’d left him and didn’t even know what had happened while she was gone. Phoenix was still angry at the other defense attorney for implying that Maya had to stay with him to understand anything. Maya had dealt with her sister’s death, and now she’d had to deal with a member of her family attempting to frame her for murder.  Not to mention that Pearls had to deal with the knowledge that her mother would be away because she had wanted to put Pearls in charge of Kurain. Maya had wanted to change some of the traditions, mostly surrounding the role of branch families and the like. She wanted to end the bitter rivalry between the branch family and the main family, and ensure it was the one who was the best qualified that was that became the next Master of Kurain. It meant that Phoenix had to look over documents and help her with legal matters as far as changing old rules without hurting others that might be required later on, or that had not become outdated just yet. It had meant long hours at Kurain, but they’d gotten most of it done, and Phoenix knew that it would be done by the time the exhaustion finally caught up with him.

Gavin still forced the issue, whenever he saw Phoenix or tried to talk to him alone, had only caused Phoenix more pain and would often mean he had to take the pills he was already taking far too often. Eldoon had also raised the price a bit, especially after some crackdowns on dealers had occurred and he didn’t want to get caught, meaning that he wasn’t selling that often and wouldn’t take the risk of selling him anything extra off of Eldoon’s own schedule.

It meant Phoenix had to get creative, and also that he had to be careful so that when he finally did succumb to the fatigue, to when everything is finally gone into the hole that he had hoped wouldn’t result in what he’d been told happened to his grandfather.

“What happened to them?” Maya finally asked, sounding like she’s still thinking about how romantic things were between the two.

“They got a small house, and managed to live there for many years before they died of old age.” He didn’t want to say the truth - that Amalthea had died when someone attacked her for letting abused horses free, that Lír had to leave as the house burned down, and that Drake had had to care for him during the final year of his life, as he wasted away from the lost connection. Grandfather’s death had been right after Phoenix’s mother had left, and was the start of Drake’s drinking as well as Phoenix’s fears with concern to the evil he’d put on someone he’d cared for. Drake’s continued life, as bad as it could be, told Phoenix that the connection Drake shared with Phoenix’s mother was still there, and he wondered briefly if she knew about it and ever used it to torment Drake. It would explain Drake’s inability to stay sober, though that also had kept his powers in check. Though Phoenix had not understood what happened to his grandfather, he now looked back on what he’d seen and could see the shades of what his own fate would be, by the end of this coming year.

Phoenix blinked as his vision swam, Maya looking over at him when he tilted a bit. “Nick?”

“It’s late, and I’m just tired.” The wave of excitement from the show was wearing off, and he managed a smile to her as he added, “plus, we need to get Pearls home, don’t we?”

Pearl looked sad, but otherwise nodded and followed them out of the snow-covered space and back to where the bus would take them to the train station. Phoenix elected to stay at Kurain for the night, instead of taking a late train back or calling Gavin. His friendship with the man was strained enough, and nothing seemed to change that either. Phoenix wouldn’t give up his friendship with Maya, or the protection that she’d offered him. Gavin would simply have to accept that, before it became too late to take anything back.

December 28, 2017

Detention Center

11:15am

Maya is annoyed to see Gavin there, apparently waiting to see if he can take on Max’s case. Maya had seen the information on tv that day and quickly got Phoenix up and heading down to the detention center, determined to prove the magi’s innocence in whatever had happened. She also wanted to get Phoenix out of his funk and back into practicing - he’d been cleaning up various places and acting odd lately, not to mention how tired he often seemed after that show-down with Lisbeth D’Arcy.

Some part of Maya knew that facing D’Arcy was a bad idea, but she also took pride in the fact that, even after all that had happened to the Fey name and the Kurain School, it had enough of a pull to get D’Arcy to back down and leave Phoenix alone. After a year of having Phoenix help her, of watching him grow from the worried and sometimes sarcastic young man that Mia had told her about, to someone who was able to hold his own against someone as foul as either von Karma, or even someone with as complex a relationship as he had with Edgeworth. It didn’t matter to Maya that D’Arcy had raised Edgeworth, or that she didn’t know what happened between the two after she’d left to focus on training and to gain better control over her power. D’Arcy had hurt Phoenix and was still hurting him emotionally. Phoenix didn’t want to talk to her about what happened, at least not beyond what he’d told her and Pearl that night, months ago, and Maya was torn between going behind his back to find out, or simply asking Gumshoe or one of their other friends what had happened.

Maya didn’t count Gavin as a friend. The few times he’d been around, he’d either tried to talk to Phoenix about ‘attorney stuff’ alone or had left Phoenix looking uncomfortable and confused by whatever he’d implied during the visit. He was only kind when he wanted to be, and the rest of the time, Maya wanted nothing more than to abuse her power as a lineage and have him kicked out of their location, or forbid him from talking to Wright. The only problem was she didn’t know how Phoenix would react to it, and she knew something was wrong with him. She wanted to make sure he was alright, and yet he seemed so...sad, and tired, all the time now. Not to mention he was taking those pills a lot more, enough that she’d noticed whenever he slipped out to take one or more of them.

Gavin smiled at them, looking pleasant, as he says, “Well, I don’t see why we can’t work on this together, Wright. We did a good job working to prove Maggey’s innocence.”

“Considering we had to work together on that case,” Phoenix pointed out, sounding annoyed, “we had little choice.” He glanced at Maya, “I don’t mind him helping us out for the investigation, but I’m worried that we won’t get far no matter who is involved.”

Gavin blinked, tilting his head. “Why do you say that?”

“Magi are worse than communities of nulls, Gavin.”

Both Maya and Gavin flinched at the admission, causing Maya to feel upset that she was able to sympathize in the same way Gavin could. Null communities, like the one Lotta was said to have come from, were notorious for taking care of things themselves and never involving outside authorities unless absolutely necessary. It was why some areas, like Chavez Ravine, became such hotly contested battle grounds and sources for violence in the past as some of the areas expanded or when they came under the ‘higher authority’ of lineages and other groups. It had been one of the many reasons Nine Tails Vale was contested between the lineages in Nine Tails and the low-levels and nulls in the nearby Tenma Town, though the two were living in a semi-state of harmony at the moment. It didn’t change that there were still areas of town that Phoenix, even as a null declared to a lineage family, could go and learn more on his own than with Maya or Gavin could ever learn from even saying they were there to prove someone’s innocence.

Phoenix is quiet a moment, thinking, then shifts and pulls something out of his pocket. Maya blinks in surprise as she sees the stylized unicorn head with a flowing mane that turned into a wave, the piece looking beautiful and possibly made of some sort of gemstone or something equally valuable. She is worried about the fact that Phoenix is holding it with a handkerchief, or the spots of red on part of it that look unnatural on the white and blue piece.

“If you two want to help, you can check out the circus while I talk to Max. He’ll be more comfortable around me in there alone.”

Gavin frowned as Maya took the item, looking at it. “Is this…?”

“If anyone asks, say it was given to you by the descendant of Amalthea Grue, and in good faith, with all the blessings of Fortuna. They should talk to you then. I’ll get over there as soon as I’m done talking to Max.”

Maya pouted as they left, glaring at Gavin as he motioned to his sports car. “I know...I’m a horrible influence on Wright, you would rather I stay away from him...but we’re working the case together, so we might as well pretend for his sake.”

Maya crossed her arms, still glaring at him.

“Yes?”

“I don’t know what you’re planning to do, but I’m not going to let you hurt Nick,” Maya told him plainly, “and neither is the rest of Kurain or the Fey family. We’re ready to stand up against the D’Arcys for him.”

Gavin paused, apparently considering what she said, then nodded. “Threat understood. Feel better?”

She didn’t. She wanted Gavin out of their lives, but she also knew that tossing him out was not going to help the case or Nick at this moment. If he was still as sick as he’d been during her trial…

“Well enough to work with you for now,” she finally said, and the two got into the car and drove to the circus in silence.

--

To be fair, neither of them thought what Phoenix had told them would work, but after getting attacked by a tiger and smiled at by a girl who was all innocence and sparkles to the point that even Gavin was conceding to her (he made a mental note to let Wright deal with the woman after this), he was just glad that it did.

He was not so happy that Wright made it back after they had to deal with that clown, or with a very angry Gumshoe who was so unhappy with events he actually complained about his job. Apparently the detective believed that Gavin helping Wright was something that would lead to ‘bad things’ or something along the lines as what Fey had thought, and that only made it harder for them to investigate that area or get information about what they were going up against for tomorrow’s trial. Gavin had flinched a bit when von Karma was mentioned as the prosecutor, mostly from his own hurt pride than from what it might mean if Wright went ahead and was the main trial lawyer, as Gavin was suspecting he’d have to be if it came to dealing with magi and with von Karma.

Gavin had faced her during the months between the Fey trial and now, in a job that normally would be easy and simple and require minimal interference. The result had been von Karma tearing into his defense and the witnesses. Gavin had been prepared for a well-prepared witness or ‘perfect’ evidence, as her father had done and pulled during the few trials that Gavin had taken against the veteran prosecutor, but Franziska was in another class and worse in some cases. With her father, you expected the things that made him a devious and evil man, and what techniques his protegee had used to get him the nickname of a Demon Prosecutor.

Franziska lived up to the von Karma perfection, but didn’t pull any of the tricks her father did. She went after every piece of evidence he found or thought about bringing up, allowed the cross-examination to bring up the witnesses shortcomings, something Gavin was ill-prepared for when that only brought up more issues between the defendant and anyone else. In the end, he’d had to go with a plea-deal, something he’d never had to do, and had a small bit of self-loathing for the new von Karma and her tactics. She’d appeared disinterested in him enough to not even bother with calling him by his full name, and simply said that she saw where his brother had gotten such a ‘lazy attitude towards law’ from. As much as Gavin did things only for himself, he didn’t take insults towards his brother lightly - Klavier was a good man and Kristoph had done his best to ensure his brother had every opportunity he could. Calling him ‘lazy’ when he understood the law so well only showed how petty von Karma was overall.

“Wright,” he said when the other defense attorney found them, as they were speaking to Regina Berry again while the tiger sat, glaring at them, “You didn’t mention I would have to suffer through horrible jokes.”

“Hey! Moe was hilarious!”

Wright made a bit of a face as Regina smiled at him. “Oh, are you Grue’s grandson? I would have loved to meet her. I’m better with lions and tigers, but I would have liked to be talented with horses.”

Wright nodded and smiled at her. “I’m Phoenix Wright. I’ll be defending Max tomorrow. And I am sorry about that, Gavin.”

Gavin finally shrugged and shook his head. “The things I do for...well…”

Maya glared at him, and Phoenix gave him an unreadable look before turning to Regina to ask about a few things. She answered him easily, not even hesitating like she had when they’d first came in, before something darted from the shadows to grab at Phoenix, scratching him and shrieking loudly when Phoenix attempted to fight back.

“Money! You stop that!”

The monkey screeched at her once before racing away, leaving Phoenix on the ground and looking quite bad as he slowly stood, groaning before Gavin spotted what the monkey had taken.

“It took his attorney’s badge,” Gavin said, upset, as Regina helped Phoenix up and Maya looked him over, worried. She hadn’t been as worried about him when Regent had attacked, but then again, Regent hadn’t actually given him scratches or a bleeding head wound.

“Are you ok?” Regina asked, sounding very upset. Next to her, Regent growled after where the monkey had gone, it’s tail moving back and forth in frustration, as if mirroring it’s trainer’s mood.

“Yeah...I do need that badge back, though.” It was one thing if anything else had been taken, but attorney’s badges were official and required paperwork to get a replacement for. Regina is nice enough to tell them where to find Money, but it involves talking to Moe again.

Phoenix doesn’t seem impressed either by Moe’s routine, and seems less happy when Moe demands a joke in order to get anywhere near the place the monkey had gone. Wright gave him one, though it wasn’t the best in the world (Gavin never did like word-play outside of court) and they quickly got into the room where Money normally stayed and where he kept most of the items he stole from others.

“Regina’s better with the lions and tigers,” Moe told them as they entered the room, “but she’d never gotten the hang of talking to Money. So he lives here with one of the other performers.” Gavin frowned at the huge pile of shiny items, many of them not valuable, but one particular one, a ring that appeared to be an engagement ring, catching his eye right away as Phoenix looked through it briefly before stepping away, looking upset or a bit ill. He frowned, moving over to reach and touch Phoenix when the other defense attorney shifted back to the pile, reaching in right as Maya let out a cheer, holding out Phoenix’s badge for him as he smiled and took it from her, putting it back on his lapel as Gavin took out the small box that appeared to be for an engagement ring. “Well, what’s this? Perhaps something the puppet might be missing?”

Phoenix took it briefly, looking over at the box before putting it in the briefcase then looking over at Gavin. “How do you want to do this, exactly?”

Gavin frowned at the change of subject, but understood that it simply meant to focus them as well. Maya was obviously annoyed with him over everything still, and especially with how things were going and with Gavin attempting to even touch him. He kept his silence, though, knowing it was better to take the high ground for now than stoop to the level of some little girl. After all, he was working with Phoenix for this case, and though he would like to deal with things in the court, he also doubted he had the information to keep Max out of the hot box for another day, especially after people heard that he attacked a fellow performer, not to mention whatever damning evidence the clown decided to bring up.

“I know I’ve been with Maya for the most part, but I think you should do the trial, if you don’t mind. Fräulein von Karma seemed to view me as more a whipping boy then an actual attorney, and for all she threatens you, at least she respects you enough to let you get a word in edgewise.”

Phoenix looked upset over the assessment before finally letting out a sigh, the odd fatigue that seemed to plague him more and more coming up again as he said, “Alright. Are you going to help with the rest of the case, then?”

Gavin shrugged, considering how the day had gone. “I think you and Maya will be far more productive. The circus folk will at least talk to you without giving us dirty looks. But if you do need help, or a ride, feel free to call.”

Maya gave him a dirty look as Phoenix nodded and the trio headed out, Phoenix still in thought as Gavin offered them a ride. Maya looked upset until Phoenix shook his head, apparently unsteady on his feet and tired after whatever day he’d had talking to Galactica for so long. “No, it’s ok, we can just take the bus. Thank you for your help, Gavin.”

“Of course,” he said with a smile, getting in to drive away as he silently cursed his luck. Fey wasn’t about to let Phoenix out of her sight now, and he doubted that von Karma would be nice about it either. The past half a year had only intensified von Karma’s bitterness towards everyone. The final ruling and push to reform the prosecutor’s offices was leaking over to some defense attorneys as well, who still worked with guilty clients but were more likely to take up von Karma’s deals if the evidence wasn’t there. Not to mention other pushes that were making things harder for him to work, or do any of the research he was planning without someone noticing.

Still, making a move after Phoenix also would’ve gotten me attention I didn’t want then either...something has to change that dynamic, and soon.

Chapter Text

December 29, 2017

District Courthouse

Franziska has never dealt with magi, and the group is so close-mouthed about what they were doing that all she can get is simply the talk about what happened, and even then, she’d nearly given up in frustration before Ambrose Frank pulled out an old, worn pin with feather attached to it and said, “I got this from my granddad, now shut it and talk to her. She’s good.”

It was only right before the trial began that she learned the item was a pin used by Wild Bill and his “Wild West” show, which seemed to straddle the line between those who had pins and magi as well. Ambrose Frank had told her that he’d tell her all about it after the trial, and to focus on that while he and Gumshoe worked on figuring out how Galactica killed Russell Berry and why.

That was the main problem, though – there was no motivation for the murder. The two witnesses she have will probably be taken apart because they obviously don’t like Galactica or his attitude, and she’s got to prepare to ensure that the stories are, in this case, good enough.

Franziska doesn’t like doing the same things as her father, and feels like telling the unfunny clown to lie about what happened will only make Phoenix Wright look at her with disdain. Still, she pushes those feelings away because she has no time for them - Father and Miles both did this, and she was only doing this with this particular witness because she knew that she needed to convict Galactica. He’d killed a man with no motivation, meaning he was unstable and putting him back with any group of people would end up with him hurting them badly.

Phoenix Wright, at least, doesn’t look as worse for wear as he had after she’d learned about his brush with her mother. Lisbeth had apparently not expected the Fey girl to be so strong, or for Phoenix Wright to still be able to tell her that she shouldn’t feel the need to continually bother him. At least when Franziska calls Fressia in order to complain, her sister agrees with her.

But Fressia was also acting very odd, asking about Phoenix. Her excuse was that she wanted to learn more about the person that Miles had so cared about, and especially since it appeared that Mother was trying to hard to make his life miserable.

Seeing him across from her, Franziska was glad that the Fey girl was there with him, and that he was facing her again after that foolish trial and the foolish way she’d behaved. She’d been new to this town and thought herself invincible. She knew she was able to beat the other prosecutors, and that meant that she only had to beat Phoenix Wright, and that would be it.

The trial starts out normally, with Gumshoe explaining what he knew and having Wright ask all of his asinine questions about the details. Then ventriloquist and his dummy are annoying, and she’s a bit surprised when he at least shuts up after Wright says, “For the love of Fortuna, shut up.”

Fortuna? She doesn’t question it as it gets the puppet to shut up and stick to his story, though it becomes harder and harder to take everything seriously as Wright points out that Trilo had to see whoever it was, and that his rivalry with Max, not to mention Max’s pettiness over everything that happened and over how Trilo acted in the dining area, would not let him say ‘good evening’ to someone like that.

It at least established doubt, and she had to hope that the clown would establish the fact that Galactica was at the scene and had killed the Ringmaster. The only thing bugging her right now was the content of the box and the way the Ringmaster died.

Who lured him out for some pepper? And why would he risk himself by doing that?

The first part of the trial ended, she went back to check on the clown, who looked rather upset and down, despite his profession.

“What are you so foolishly down over?”

“It’s just stage fright. I’m sure I can cheer everyone up with a joke,” the clown said, starting to smile.

“You’re not here to perform,” she growled at him, fingers itching for her whip, “You’re here to testify about what you saw the night the Ringmaster died so his murderer can be put in jail!”

The clown deflated again. “Oh.”

There was only so much time, and she finally said, “Tell them what you saw about the murder, and we can send Galactica to prison, or wherever the magi send him. I do have one question.”

He perked up, and she finally took in a breath. Why do I want to know about such a foolish thing? Because that fool across from me was so important to Miles? Because I grew up learning about him and all that pain he suffered foolishly? Or because I simply want to know?

“Who is Fortuna?”

The clown blinked, looking surprised. “I haven’t heard that name in...stars, years.”

“Stars?”

“We all swear by something, usually what we put in our own badges.” He pointed to the multi-star badge of the Berry Big Circus. “Fortuna was from Mommy Fortuna, a traveling group back in the day. They were known for side-shows and animal-taming. If Regina had been alive back then, she would’ve gone to train with one of Fortuna’s animal handlers.” He looked upset over something, then let out a breath. “A Harpy got them.”

“A Harpy. A mythical animal?”

“We call her a Harpy because the woman is just that, an evil bitch,” hearing the clown’s anger and disgust nearly caught Franziska up short. “That circus disappeared one day, and whatever happened to it, the police didn’t care. It’s why Frank and Wright only get in and we only trust the ones they trust. Someone told the Harpy were Fortuna was heading, and now they’re gone.”

“So why would Wright swear by Fortuna? He’s a null, not a magi.”

The clown beamed, as if happy at a memory or the thought of something. “He’s Grue’s grandson...Amalthea Grue was the best horse-trainer ever. Shame what happened to her.”

“If you’re going to talk in riddles…”

The clown blinked, as if confused, “I don’t do riddles that well, to be fair, though I know a few good ones. And it’s not a riddle about what happened to her, you just need to ask the right questions. Still...I hoped her grandson wouldn’t follow after his grandda, but something bad happened to Wright, didn’t it?”

“It’s not part of the trial, so it’s no concern to you,” she told him, her anger rising as the bailiff came to usher them in, stopping to tell him, “If you say you saw Galactica do it, then his fate will be sealed. Understand?” The clown nodded and Franziska walked in, trying hard to focus on the case and not on what she’d just learned.

Wright’s grandmother had probably been killed, and his grandfather had...what? Died of a broken heart? She didn’t want to believe that Wright had ever been so invested in her brother’s fate, but she’s beginning to think that maybe he was, and that only makes her anger at him and what happened to Miles, not to mention the jade outline he now wore to show his declaration towards the Feys, all the more fierce. He should be wearing pearl, or ruby, anything to attach him to Miles, and her brother should be here to wear a similar design on his own pin, even when they faced each other as rivals in court. Instead, that green color on the pin only reminds her that her brother cared enough to even think of declaring intent, and that it was refused around the same time that the prosecutor’s high office had been pushing him to the point of breaking, reminding him that they only wanted him as father’s clone, not as himself.

She took out her anger as she thought on what happened on the clown, mostly because of his stupid jokes and inability to really take the whole thing seriously, while Wright had to sit there and ask him questions in the hopes the clown wouldn’t make another joke or talk about his problems. She’s not surprised that Wright is able to pull out that the clown was lying when he says he witnessed the murder, and she does her best to be unaffected by the glare that Wright sends her. As if the defense don’t pull dirty tricks all the time anyway - she nearly had Gavin on quite a few of his, as well-crafted as they were, and she’s dealt with enough of them that she’s seen why Father did his best to ensure cases were run the way he did. She doesn’t like it, but she’s not going to be upset that Wright now thinks she’s the same as her father. Even Miles told witnesses to omit things if they weren’t relevant to the court. There’s no reason she should be glared at simply because of something all prosecutors and defense attorney’s did.

The clown suddenly begins to talk, saying he saw the silhouette that could only be Galactica, and he appears both mad and almost in a hurry to testify and prove himself. She knows it’s not because of what she or the judge have threatened him with either, and while his testimony seems solid, she can tell that Wright is focused on what he’s said and if there are any holes in it.

And he’s more focused on that instead of on her.

What do the magi know about him, and why do they seem so invested in making sure he’s alright? And what did that clown mean when he asked if something had happened to Wright?

--

Phoenix is uncomfortable with the line of questioning he knows he has to go into with Moe. He also knows why Moe suddenly backtracks so quickly about how Max left the scene of the crime. Saying it out loud in court will probably bring unwanted attention to the circus, and some part of Phoenix also knows he won’t be trusted by the other magi if he says it.

At the same time, even knowing what Moe will say, Phoenix has his doubts it will be listened to or acknowledged, and if they do manage to figure this out, the circus could have time to get away, or to hide Max. It was bad enough they had to testify and not deal with this themselves, but to admit to something that Phoenix knew would bring attention…

The fact that Moe was almost constantly arguing with the Judge also didn’t help matters, but he hoped that would just make what he claimed more likely to dismiss.

“What type of stupid question is ‘how did he leave the crime scene?’! The answer’s obvious! He just turned around and walked away!”

“...You’re sure that’s how it happened?”

The judge blinked at the question before he said, “Do you have proof he’s lying?”

Phoenix showed the crime scene photo. “The problem is the footprints in the snow. In the photo, we can clearly see the footprints of the victim. But the criminal’s footprints aren’t there.”

There was one out, and Phoenix was going to take it. At least that way, Moe didn’t have to say what they both knew he would be forced to say if Phoenix continued to push him. All he had to do was push that Moe’s testimony was bad and it could be thrown out - that would lead to more searching of the circus, but it would at least mean that they wouldn’t have to worry about people trying to figure out if Max could actually fly or not. Phoenix was pretty sure he couldn’t, but he didn’t want to take that risk.

The problem is that Moe protests getting his testimony struck down, instead saying he’ll tell them the ‘truth’, though von Karma tries to get them to stop and incurs the wrath of the judge for trying to keep the truth out.

“He told me what he’s about to say, and all I could think at the time was this,” von Karma said, pulling on her whip, “It wasn’t funny.”

At least even after Moe tells about Max ‘flying’ from the crime scene, neither Franziska nor the Judge believe it. The problem is, Phoenix knows it’s the truth...not because he knows Max can fly, but because he doubts Moe would make up that part of the story for a laugh. Even if it makes Max look guilty, the fact that von Karma sends her whip his way and growls out, “Only a foolish looking fool could be fooled by such a foolish fool’s foolish dream. Don’t be ridiculous! Max is a null, he can’t use any type of magic to fly!”

The Judge slammed his gavel down, telling von Karma simply, “Though I’d like to believe that the murderer could fly, I know that is not the fact. However, the only way that I can see your case as sound is if I disregard the evidence presented, as well as the testimony. So I will extend this case a day, and hopefully by the end of it, you will have some answers.”

They head back outside as Max says that he can’t fly and Maya looks upset before saying, “I don’t want to hear the secret, though! You can’t tell me, that’s, like, the cardinal rule of magi, isn’t it?”

Max looks worried and Maya walks out to get a cab before Max says, “Why did Moe go there?”

“Maybe he doesn’t know how the trick is done...or someone did fly.”

Max lets out a huff and then glances at him. “I’m not like you, I don’t have anything extra besides my charm and my smarts. I’m a good magi, but I’m not that good.”

Phoenix does his best not to stiffen, and Max lets out another sigh. “Yeah, it took me a while to get used to it, not to mention I’m doing my best to not say anything. It’s like this secret that’s out for magi, but not for others. It’s weird.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Phoenix grounds out, looking away as Max scrutinizes him and finally reaches to tap his hand lightly. Phoenix jumps at that, glaring at him and at the upset look Max has.

“Whatever else, you probably would’ve been better off as a magi. Not as jumpy. I heard enough about magi and I’m trying for Regina. She’s a trainer, and most tamers and trainers are special in their own way. Like your grandma.”

“Max…” Phoenix finally ground out, the heat rising in him and making it hard to hold back, “shut up. Now.”

Max did, Phoenix turning and quickly pulling out a pill before taking it, dry-swallowing and working to calm down. They had little time - it was already nearing 3pm and they only had a short window to figure out what happened. They needed more information, and Phoenix overreacting was not going to help out. He didn’t want this job, though, because all it did was remind him of what his fate was, of what had happened to grandma and grandpa, and now von Karma was acting like her father. He was almost glad he hadn’t been able to sense how she felt, because feeling the same dark emotions and horrible feelings he’d emitted. Not to mention the mere thought of what he’d done to Maya nearly caused his powers to flare and boil under the permafrost that they’d been cracking and destroying.

“I’m sorry,” Phoenix managed as the police came to take Max back to his cell. “I...it’s been a long year.”

“...I see. I’m sorry to have upset you, then. I suppose telling the others that will only get more questions, so...I can hold it until you get me acquitted.”

Phoenix managed a grateful smile as Max went back to the detention center and Maya came to get him, the two heading back to his offices as they tries to figure out what to do. Phoenix was just glad for the chance to sit, the exhaustion he’d been hoping would leave with a case rearing it’s head as he did his best to stay awake as Maya said something about a Grand Prix for the Steel Samurai and a movie that they had to go see with Pearls when this case was done.

“Nick...do you need me to call Gavin again?”

He shook his head, managing to stand up and wishing he had the money to get more pills, but that probably wasn’t going to happen until after this case was done. The lack of pills and the small bouts of withdrawals were only making his exhaustion worse, not to mention that his powers were still feeding off itself, rolling underneath like a super-volcano, waiting to go off with the right stresser.

I’d rather shoot myself than have that happen. I’d rather the poison she gave me actually worked on me.

“I’m just...tired, but we need to figure this out. I can’t call Gavin in for this, not when he wasn’t in the courthouse, and I don’t want to involve him anymore than necessary, even if he is the only defense attorney that will help us.” The others hadn’t really contacted Phoenix, outside of congratulating him in the most professional and impersonal ways, and Phoenix wasn’t about to trust Gavin any further than he could throw him.

They go to speak to Max first, the performer making small-talk with Maya and, at least, giving his own reason for disliking the other performers in the circus. The mention of the International Grand Prix makes the two pause, Max showing them a photo after he won and smiling at the memory. “That was the first stage I flew on. There’s a lot of talents and being able to fly was not one of them. It was great, and I loved all the applause and acclaim I got. It was great. I want everyone who’s a magi or performer to feel that...I just wish I could explain that to the other people in the circus, at least without them saying I sound ‘stuck up’ or not listening to me.” He pushed the photo to them, saying, “Here, you try. Grue’s grandson might have more of a chance.”

“I dunno how,” Phoenix said as he took the photo, “besides just telling them what you said. I’d rather you try.”

Max nodded. “Well, when you get me out of here, I’ll do just that.”

They were heading back to the circus when Maya finally said, “Was your grandma famous?”

“I guess. The circus she was part of was apparently very famous. I didn’t know a lot about it, since it disbanded years ago.”

Phoenix hopes that Maya believes all of the lies he’s telling her, so that he can at least get her ready for when he has to tell her the truth about what will happen soon.

Big Berry Circus

3:30pm

“You didn’t have to put poor Gumshoe in charge of listening to that clown’s jokes,” Frank argued as they began their search of the acrobat’s room. Since Gumshoe had been so close to her brother, it made things hard for him to work with her professionally, not to mention she had the sneaking suspicion he was hiding something from her. Frank, at least, she could talk to and wasn’t afraid to speak his mind or argue with her, even when she pulled out her whip.

“He didn’t have to botch so many investigations,” she argued back, upset over the events of the day. Flying man...how foolish!

“What’s got you in a twist?”

“Something the clown said about Phoenix Wright, not to mention that we’re here, investigating if a null can fly.”

Frank frowned and looked over to her. “What did the clown say about Wright?”

“That he was related to someone...Grue or something…”

She looked over at where he’d frozen, halfway down the hall, and glared. “What are you so surprised about?”

“He’s Amalthea Grue’s grandson?”

“How does everyone know that name?”

“First of all, anyone related to magi or at a low enough power level know about Grue and what happened to her. Secondly, none of us knew who she married, only that she did and disappeared until the reports about her death.”

Franziska crossed her arms, annoyed. “The clown knew.”

“The clown probably knew because Phoenix swore by Fortuna or still has the pin of that troupe,” Frank said, “and either way, why are you so upset over that?”

Franziska is quiet as he points out, “Being able to talk to magi or get their trust by being the grandson of someone isn’t the best thing, you know.”

“It’s what else the clown said...he said that something bad must have happened to Wright, because he looked like his grandfather after Grue died. At least, it was implied.”

Frank is quiet, watching her, then says, “You’re pissed that he might be still beating himself up over what happened with Edgeworth.”

“He has no right to do so. He rejected my brother and his offer--.”

“Your brother never made an offer,” Frank said, “and I don’t know who told you he did. He was probably thinking about it during the Skye case, but that was a tough one for both of them.”

“And yet Phoenix Wright is here and my brother isn’t.”

Frank finally explodes at her, stalking up to get close and looking angry with her for the first time since she got here, “Phoenix Wright nearly wasn’t here. I don’t care what your mother or anyone else told you, but you weren’t here to deal with any of the shit that hit the fan after your dad tried to send Edgeworth up for murder, or when Skye and Gant were on trial. Wright was in a bad way, he found the damned suicide note, and half of us were waiting for him to disappear too, or for us to get in a call and have to deal with Hari. When he didn’t do either, we were at least fine with it because he’s a good guy. He doesn’t try to barge in or tell us how to do our jobs, let alone tamper with evidence like some of the other attorneys or prosecutors. And he was good for your brother, that much we knew. Hell, he was good for Payne, and that man is a damned asshole about a lot of things, though I am glad he’s not like his brother, who’s a rat-bastard if I ever met one. So don’t think that, just because you knew Edgeworth longer, you knew what went down. That case got the better of everyone, and your brother took the lion’s share of the burden. He shouldn’t have done it, but he did, and now he’s gone. You don’t get to blame Wright for that, you blame the District Prosecutor, who I may remind you was recently fired because your mom found out he was putting pressure on Edgeworth to be more like your dad. You blame Skye and Gant. But you don’t blame Wright for something he had no control over.”

She wants to scream at him, instead gripping the whip tightly as she glares him down. Phoenix Wright had everything to do with this! Her brother’s return to the states? Because Wright had left his home and written what happened. Miles and her looking to even the playing field, knowing that high-levels and lineages could work to better the lives of nulls and low levels? Because Wright had befriended Miles in their childhood, because Miles had seen all that happened to him when he was growing up here, and read between the lines. Miles’ hate of abusers? Because of Wright! All of it lead back to him, and she knew that whatever else had happened, Miles had been lost, had begun to doubt himself as a prosecutor, the moment Phoenix Wright appeared across from him to defend that Fey woman he was now declared to, her and her whole family had kept Wright from Edgeworth and now, now he was working with and getting help from Kristoph Gavin, was allowing him near when he hadn’t allowed anything of the sort with Miles.

She knows her memories and feelings about Miles cloud her judgement. Considering that Wright has shown himself to be a great defense attorney and able to deal with things under pressure has only meant that her finally beating him will be an occasion for celebration. And when she’s done, she can make sure that he at least keeps his status - she’s not so petty as to beat him then have him thrown out. She simply needs to prove he can be beaten, that he has a lucky streak and that’s worn out.

The two are professional around Ken Dingling, the acrobat on the third floor. Franziska is seething over the fact that the man is located on the third floor when he’s obviously been injured and badly. The fact that he wasn’t available yesterday because he was visiting a doctor, and that the injury was apparently recent enough for the circus to consider permanent residence. Still, the fact that he’d seen Max Galactica fly by his window was enough for Franziska, and the man’s calm manner and attitude at least calmed her down by the time they left from the interview.

Frank leaves to go see about what he can find out, so Franziska leaves the lodge on her own, spotting Gumshoe as he races away from where he was speaking to Wright and Fey. Fey is hanging on Wright’s arm like they’re together, smiling at him and making a joke of some sort. He manages a warm smile at her as Franziska lets her whip go, satisfied when the crack of it separates the two and sends the Fey girl stumbling back foolishly.

“What was that for?” Fey demanded, glaring at Franziska as she approached the two. Wright looked over at her and finally said, “If you’ve come to gloat, could you be quick about it? It’s cold out here and we have more people to question.”

She snorted, amazed he even picked up on that. “I have a conclusive witness, and conclusive evidence.”

“A conclusive witness, huh? So the acrobat upstairs?”

She forces herself to calm down. He’s picking up on too much and it’s starting to feel more and more like all she’s doing is handing him victories if he knows the witnesses. Not to mention that he’s able to find out enough to turn the tide of any of their testimonies most of the time.

“I’m amazed you picked up on that, Mr. Phoenix Wright. Tomorrow will be the day I beat you! Mark my words!”

“So you say,” Wright said with a shrug, apathetic to the whole thing as he turned to head inside, stopping when Fey finally yelled at Franziska.

“And you stop giving him the evil eye! You and your mom! I know you miss your dad, but--.”
“Quiet, or you’ll get a mouthful of whip.” As Fey quieted, Franziska said, “I never brought up the name of my papa, and I’m not going after Wright because of that. Papa made his choice and he must live with it. I’m doing this for him...my little brother, Miles Edgeworth!”

Fey gasped, Wright not bothering to turn to look at them, but not moving away either.

“But...I mean...Phoenix and he a--were…”

So she knows.

“I considered him my little brother. He was my father’s protogee, and I cared for him a great deal. I see you know about his disappearance.”

Fey is quiet as Franziska said, “I know he disappeared along that stretch of river, but people have come out of there before, alive and whole. I know my brother is somewhere, but I also know that, if he did not return, it was for a good reason. The prosecutors who have harassed and so harmed him are gone, so why does he stay away? I know why.” She glared at Wright, or at least at his back. “It’s your fault. The others killed him as a prosecutor, but you killed him as a person. You were a coward who threw all the things he was offering you back in his face and now you stand there and act like--.”
Wright turned, and the look of him made the words die in Franziska’s throat. The raw emotion and hurt on it is almost enough to make her resolve falter, and the sudden gasp she hears from Fey is enough to know she sees it too. As briefly and suddenly as they saw it, all of the emotion is suddenly gone, and it leaves her shivering, aware of the cold and snow as he glared at her.

“I’ve had about all I can take of you, Franziska von Karma. I told you before, and I’ll say it again. Defeating me isn’t going to bring Edgeworth back. He isn’t in some other country, he isn’t in hiding, he isn’t waiting for me to be defeated or for you to prove yourself in some grand gesture. He’s dead, and the sooner you accept that, the sooner you can move on with your life.”

He turned and stalked back into the lodge, Fey watching only briefly before she said, quietly, “He told me...after the trial. I didn’t want to believe it either. He...they were rivals, and I hoped…”

“What?”

“I hoped I wouldn’t have to declare our intent to have him as a friend of the family and our lawyer. That I’d return and he’d be wearing something and say ‘Oh, Edgeworth gave it to me.’ But instead...he’s sick. My sis...she said his chakras were sick, that he might be dying, and I can’t get him to tell me anything.” When she looked back at Franziska von Karma, she looked like the Master of Kurain, and von Karma blinked at how serious this other girl had become, how both were now grown-up when it came to protecting those they held dear.

“Don’t bring up Edgeworth again, and he should be fine. But if your mother comes near him again, D’Arcy or no, I will bring up my family’s lineage against hers.”

Franziska looked at this girl, her equal in age and responsibility, before finally saying, “You won’t get the chance, because she isn’t going to face him down again. I told her that was my duty, and even if it’s just for me, it is mine alone. If she speaks to him again, you tell me, and I will handle it. If not, I will aid your lineage.”

Fey looked surprised at the announcement. To aid against your family, ranked lineage or not, was a very serious thing. To aid against your own mother, who held your full name and some power over you...that was far more serious. Franziska had just put herself in Wright’s camp, as far as that was concerned, even if she wouldn’t be near it during a court-battle. But in everything else, she was on Fey’s side and would protect Wright from Lisbeth.

“Don’t dwell on it too much. You’re right - my brother cared for him in that way.” She knew now that it wasn’t so simple as her mother had said, as what she’d believed, but that didn’t change her views about Phoenix Wright, “Whatever kept him from Miles Edgeworth’s side was very big indeed. I just hope he gets better. I expect more than just two court-cases out of him.”

Fey glared at her and finally turned and walked into the lodge, Franziska going to find Gumshoe and to get her case together. She could look into the rest later.

Chapter Text

Maya worries over everything as they continue away from Acro’s room. Even after hearing what he said, she worries as they go back. Nick is cold and quiet again, something she hates to see in him, and she wonders if maybe they shouldn’t take a rest or do something to help him. It’s been nearly a year since Edgeworth disappeared, since he possibly died, and Maya wishes she’d been able to come and help Phoenix during that time, no matter what he said.

They make it back to the Big Top as they meet up with Regina, who tells them something that gets her to frown as she considered what she said, especially when they talked to her about her father.

“Daddy explained it to me, after what happened with Léon. When someone dies, they just become a star in the heavens. It’s why I love the nighttime so much, especially on clear nights. I can see all of the people who came before me, and they can see me. So I’m not worried…Daddy’s up there, watching over me.”

Nick asked her a few more questions before they headed out to find Money, Maya staying quiet about what had happened and what she’d seen. Despite her wish to know what was going on with Nick and what had happened when she was gone, she knows that she can’t pull it out. She wants to find someone who was there and talk to them, but she hardly ever sees Gumshoe or any of his team outside of investigations, and she’s not about to ask Gavin for a favor.

After getting the costume back, the pretty vest sparkling and far too small for her, they head back to a very happy Regina. Maya’s grateful for the happiness that Regina displays, if only because it means that Nick is able to blush and smile in a way that’s almost like his old self.

The story about Léon is sad but also oddly vague, and Nick appears contemplative before they head to the cafeteria.

Moe is there making burgers for the night, even giving them two as Maya makes happy sounds over them. The burgers are delicious, and she wonders if Moe missed his calling as a chef. He does say that he wants to become the Ringmaster, and that while Max would be an issue, he was right about them needing to shoot big. “I just hope we can all get over what happened…”

“Get over...what?”

The Psyche-Locks slam into place, but Nick is able to get them to break fairly quickly. Moe explained that Regina believed in Léon, and that she ‘knew he believed in her abilities’. The Ringmaster had allowed the dangerous act, despite some protests from the others. Russell Berry was a good man, but he could never say ‘no’ to his daughter or to anyone who wanted to join the circus. It had been how they got Acro and many of the other performers.

The story about Bat, Acro’s brother, is worse to hear and Maya feels sad over what happened. The Circus had to take care of things on their own, and because of Bat’s injury, had not moved on.

“That’s why, with this incident, we had no choice but to go to the police and have outsiders deal with it. We have to stay here, for Bat’s sake as well as for Acro’s. We can’t just leave him here - magi on their own, especially hurt magi, never make it long without someone to care for them, and we don’t know anyone here.”

Nick was silent a moment before saying, “Thank you for telling us this, Moe. I need to check one more thing, then I think we’ll be able to finish this off and find out what really happened.”

December 30, 2017
District Courthouse

3:14pm

Franziska von Karma was still upset over the advice she’d taken from him, and Gumshoe was just glad that he’d been able to convince her of Mr. Edgeworth’s idea. Getting a phone call from him, the first time since he’d left that Mr. Edgeworth had called instead of Gumshoe calling him, had only been a signal to Gumshoe that Mr. Edgeworth would soon be home and able to prove that he was alive.

The only issue would probably be Mr. Wright, and how Miss von Karma had acted. She had done some stuff that was getting close to the same bad tactics that Mr. Edgeworth had been using, and that her Dad had taught them.

“I understand your concern,” Edgeworth told Gumshoe over the phone, “but Franziska is very stubborn. She isn’t going to change her mind about how things are run simply because you don’t like it. My main concern right now is Wright.”

Gumshoe swallows, wishing he had good news. He isn’t sure how, other than the fact that he listened to the clown and was straight with him, but he knows one thing for sure.

“You gotta get back here soon, sir. I talked ta Marilyn about it and she said that he doesn’t have long. She’s almost awake too, and she’d really like to meet ya in person.”

There was a bit of silence over the other line. “I am working to get back. I need to be able to not only return, but to return and be ready.”

“Sir?”

“I have been looking into things, and I’m worried about what will happen. I cannot shock Wright too much, nor can I just ‘return’ and hope everything is alright. I don’t know what will happen, but have to be strong, and I have to be ready to keep Wright upright until he’s better.”

Gumshoe knew that meant Mr. Edgeworth had been watching the released video of the trials. It meant that he’d seen Mr. Wright fall over, and that he’d seen the recent case. Even with Mr. Edgeworth helping and directing him in some ways, Gumshoe still worried and knew that something bad was happening to Mr. Wright.

Not to mention that Frank was all over the fact that Wright was taking some pretty heavy stuff, and trying to track it down was a pain. Frank was really upset over it ‘cause of how potent it was and how addicting, but he didn’t know why it would be something that would stop Wright when he was having that fit or whatever happened to him during his brief incarceration, or how long Wright had been taking it. That was the main part, and the one part that Gumshoe knew would make things either worse or really worse.

“He’ll forgive ya, pal, I know he will.”

“I’m more worried about his health right now. I can accept him hating me for however long he wants, so long as he’s alive to do it.”

The fact that Mr. Edgeworth was admitting to it...that only made Gumshoe freeze right before he got an incoming text from Miss von Karma, to go to her office. “I gotta go, sir. I’ll see you soon.”

He didn’t wait for Mr. Edgeworth to end the call, instead going to Miss von Karma’s office and waiting to see what she’d have to say. Frank was there too, and he performed a small dampening spell, to keep others from hearing what they were saying, before von Karma spoke.

“I have looked into everything that we can find about Mr. Phoenix Wright’s grandparents.”

“Ma’am?”

Frank let out a breath. “Wright’s grandmother was a famous magi. She died in a way that only recently was reopened.” He looks annoyed, and Gumshoe glances over at von Karma to see her looking livid. At least she and Mr. Edgeworth both shared the idea that everyone deserved justice, or to be put away fairly. She’d even been fairly lenient with Acro, and magi were often considered as bad if not worse than nulls, even if the magi showed any sort of power. At least with the circus remaining, or most of the people having a place for them and having a place for them to perform out of, there was still a lot of mistrust and dislike over how things ended for the trial. But the changes to ideas and how people lived only meant that fewer were so quick to demand a stronger sentence or were just as quick to tell others that they shouldn’t be so old-fashioned and stuck-up.

“So what happened?”

Frank let out a breath. “Wright’s grandmother was a famous magi. She died in a way that only recently was reopened was reopened after her killer, Ken Haggard, was put on trial for brutalizing a null officer who was there to claim the animals on his ranch. That and the way his longtime field hand, Reed Bole, acted towards him and others, meant that old cases were reopened and refilled.” She’s quiet a moment, crossing her arms in the same way her father and Mr. Edgeworth had done whenever they were thinking or considering something. “Frank is here because he made a breakthrough with the pills you found on Wright after his arrest.”

Gumshoe frowns, looking over at the forensic detective as he pulls out the report. Franziska looks upset as well, and Gumshoe guesses that she knows exactly what’s in that report.

“To make a reading of chemicals short, it’s a mix of things that aren’t good and should be restricted,” Frank told him, “and it’s very heavy. We’re not that surprised he had his…incident…after reading the results.”

Gumshoe stiffens at the reminder, of the panic they’d all felt when the alarm had gone up. Franziska glances at them as Gumshoe reluctantly says, “It was like that incident during your first trial with him, Miss von Karma. Only he didn’t just faint, ma’am, he kinda was…um…” he glanced at Frank, who finally said, “Wright was showing signs of mild seizures, or similar non-epilectic fits, before he fainted at the end of the trial for Maya Fey. As far as we can tell, that’s from low blood-pressure.”

“And that’s not…I mean, what’s it got to do with the chemicals?”

“The chemicals are what’s causing his adverse reactions,” Frank pointed out bluntly, “and I can’t for the life of me figure out what else they’d be used for. I can say that I doubt Wright is going to last more than a few months if he keeps taking those pills and not actually getting any sort of treatment.” At the two inquisitive looks, he shifted. “I have my sources, but as far as I can tell, Wright’s never been to a doctor or allowed a doctor to treat him without protesting a great deal. There’s hardly any medical data on him, so I’m only going on what I’ve seen, and that is that the pills are making him very sick.”

Durango Hospice

December 31, 2017

Marilyn is quiet as Gumshoe explains what he heard, looking out the window then back to her own body. “I know you said it was bad that you broke the connection, or at least you thought it was, but…”

“I knew it was,” Marilyn said, “but I didn’t know how bad it could get, or what the effect would be on Mr. Wright. I didn’t want him to get hurt like that, and I didn’t think that it would react like Mr. Edgeworth had died. If I had…”

“What’s so bad about that?” Gumshoe asked, looking worried, “Mr. Edgeworth is really pushing to come back, but he’s got a lot of stuff to do, and--.”

“We don’t live very long after someone we’ve connected with have died,” she explained, “but it can depend on the connection. I didn’t think that it was one of mutual-affection, that they both did like each other. I also didn’t think that Mr. Wright would take anything to try and dull it.” She shifts, her form more and more like that of her physical self than the movie star she admired. “Some of us can break it without any issues, but others can’t break it no matter what. They always end up dying.”

“M-Mr. Wright is dying?”

She slowly nods. “He probably only has a few months left, if those pills are to keep his powers in check. Without them, he would’ve been further towards death. As it stands, he might survive  until...March, at the most.”

“Well, what if Mr. Edgeworth comes back?” Gumshoe asked, worry creeping into his voice as he shifted in his seat. “That’ll work, right?”

Marilyn is quiet a long moment. “I don’t know.”

Kurain Village

January 3, 2018

New Year’s with Maya and Pearl was a great time, the village’s enthusiasm and wish to make a better year than the last two had been.

Phoenix manages to stay upright for the first two days of celebration, but between the snow, cold, and his dwindling supply of pills that he hadn’t been able to restock, he’s sluggish and tired by the third. The broken tundra and permafrost he’s hidden his powers under is steaming with the rolling energy, and it’s only a matter of time before it either explodes out or simply folds in and every bit of warmth leaves him.

He feigns a cold to keep Maya and Pearl away from him as he rides out the pain as quietly as he can. A cold at least means that they come by and put down chicken soup or something hot for him to drink or eat, but that they also don’t bother him about it either. Maya knows about his dislike of cold weather, and while she hadn’t been around when he’d been attempting to stop his powers from latching onto him, he knew that someone might speak up if he talked about what was going on. After all, Gavin had been there, as had Ema and Salmone. If anything, Salmone would be the one to barge in and demand he tell them what’s going on while being subjected to all sorts of care and tea and whatever else she can make.

He’s a bit surprised when his Dad arrives and puts a hand on his forehead, frowning as he looks at him sadly. “You idiot.”

“hello to you too,” Phoenix mutters, not having the energy to argue with his father or anyone, really.

“You’re not going to die on me, Nick. Not for that brat.”

“kinda late to take it back,” he said, looking up at his father from the small mound of blankets he was under. “I didn’t want it, dad. but he was hurting so much...I couldn’t let him be alone.” He felt himself curl up a bit and shiver, grateful for the contact, however small, that his father was giving him and allowing him to connect, even just a bit.

Their relationship was always bad when Drake was drinking, mostly because Drake never really had a filter and his worst tendencies came out more and more often. It was so odd to see him sober, but Phoenix always welcomed the few times he had gotten to that place, or the times when he was getting there. In those times, Drake was his dad, not the person that he’d become while drunk...not someone being nearly-constantly pounded by a small connection full of hatred towards them.

“It hurts, dad,” Phoenix said, trying hard to sound as tired and frightened as he was. “he was…I did that, I made him--.”

Drake let out a breath, shaking his head as he shifted to move Phoenix up a little, cradling him like he had when he was younger, before he’d started drinking. “It’s not your fault, Nick.”

“I…I tried to stop it, after…but now I can feel it eating at me. I don’t want to leave Maya and Pearls. I can’t do this to them. Why did I do something so stupid?”

“You cared for him, and you thought it was returned. That bitch taught you that love could be one-sided…your mother taught me that all too well. If I could have stopped him from hurting you like this, if I could get him back here, I would.” Drake is quiet. “I don’t know enough to keep you from my dad’s fate. I never wanted that for you, Nick. I could hardly stand to watch him fade like that, and now…” He drew in a breath. “I’ll try to protect Maya and Pearls for you. No matter what, Nick, I’ll keep them safe for you.”

Nick swallows, shifting, and finally says, “They can take care of themselves, Dad. I don’t want them to worry about me after this. I can’t let Maya be so sad, not after all she’s been through.”

Drake is quiet for a long time before he finally asks, “What do you want me to do?”

“Leave. Get on with your life, stop letting that woman lead it. And if you ever drink again, I’ll find a way to haunt you for it.”

Drake is quiet before he mutters, “You’re a hypocrite, Nick. I know about the pills.”

“They’re the only thing keeping me sane,” Nick argued back, hating how it went from offering comfort to both of them being defensive.

“Drink does the same thing for me,” Drake told him, “It kept everything in check. Figuring out what I can do and not having any is only making me want to drink more, not to mention want to keep the bitch in the back of my head quiet. If I could sever that connection and not die, I would. I wait for the day when I don’t feel her and I start to fade. And now you’re doing it instead, you’re fading for that brat, and telling me to stop drink and to not look over your friends. I can’t do that, Nick. I need something, or I won’t be able to stop myself from going into the ground right after you, and for a stupider reason.” Phoenix wishes his father didn’t make such good points when he was sober. “You’re asking me to watch you die and just leave here, Nick. I can’t do that anymore than the others could. And you have to stop taking those pills. I saw some of those officers snooping around. They’ll put two and two together and you--.”

“Edgeworth died in late January,” Phoenix interrupted him, getting his father’s attention, “and the pills have kept my powers at bay, kept them so far from me it feels like everyone is emotionless. I can’t hardly feel anything beyond the strongest emotions…and I know that I’ll be able to live until March.”

He looks down at Phoenix, surprised, as Phoenix curls a bit more, trying to keep in his body’s heat that has been leaving him, like he’s stuck in a snowy field without anything to cover himself. “It’s only starting to disappear, to eat itself down or go into that hole he left. I have at least two months, then…I have that time, at least, to get Maya ready.”

Drake is quiet for a very long time, then lets out a long, sad sigh. “She’ll never be ready, Nick. She cares too much for you. No matter what you say or do, she’ll never be ready for it.”

Phoenix knows that Drake is trying to be positive, to think that Phoenix will simply be there one day and dead the next, like Grandpa was…but Phoenix doesn’t want to bother anyone like that. Even with the hole left, the final sight, the view of Dusky Bridge, is in his mind and has been playing over and over again.

What better way to put out a fire then to drown it?

Chapter Text

January 4, 2018

Pearl wishes that Mr. Drake had been able to stay for longer than he had - the project was apparently short and while a few others stayed, Mr. Drake had to leave and had looked very sad when he did. She always liked him and seeing him so sad when Mr. Nick was so sad as well made Pearl unhappy and wish she knew what was going on.

She also suddenly knew why Mr. Drake avoided Mystic Maya. She’d seen Mr. Drake got into Mr. Nick’s room and come out looking sad, but the brief moment reminded her so much of when Mr. Nick looked sad, when he’d been thinking about Mr. Eh-ji-werth, that Pearl suddenly realized they were related and Mr. Drake was probably Mr. Nick’s father.

She remembers that Mystic Maya had said that Mr. Drake was a bad man who wasn’t nice to Mr. Nick, but also that he’d been drinking bad things a lot, and Pearl remembers that he’d stopped, so maybe he was better when he’d stopped? She wished she’d been able to ask him before he left, or that she could ask Mr. Nick about it. He’s been sick all since yesterday and is still sick today, staying bundled up in lots of layers and not leaving his room. When Pearl finally asked Mystic Maya about it, she considered before saying, “Nick’s always been like that with cold weather. He’s not really good with it, and since he’s been feeling sick and it’s snowing outside, he’s just not feeling any better.”

“Can we cheer him up, or give him tea? Mama taught me how to brew tea, though mine’s not as bitter as hers.”

Mystic Maya made a face. “I’m glad, that was terrible tea.”

“Mystic Maya!”

She smiles at her. “I’m kidding, Pearly, but it takes a while to perfect the art of making tea. And I took some soup to him a little while ago. He should be fine. He just needs to rest.”

That doesn’t stop Pearl from being worried, or noticing that Mystic Maya is worried too. Of course she is, because Mr. Nick is her ‘special someone’ and she gave him a special pin and the magatama and he can see Psyche-Locks. He’s also saved Mystic Maya twice, and he’s a great person, so he has to be Mystic Maya’s ‘special someone’!

Mama never talked about her ‘special someone’ that helped her ‘make’ Pearl. Pearl knows that you need two people to make another person, but not what it involves. She also knows that a lot of time, that someone is special. But Mama never talked about the person who helped make Pearl, only to say that they weren’t the ‘special someone’ she wanted to stay with. Pearl wasn’t sure if that was a good or bad thing, though others have found their ‘special someones’ and always stayed with them. She just hopes Mystic Maya and Mr. Nick get it soon so that they can make a new Master, since Pearl isn’t sure if she’s up for the job and wants to be able to take care of someone like that. It was why she didn’t understand why Mama was so upset that she was supposed to take care of the Master - Pearl can’t wait to take care of the Master, to be the one training everyone and making sure she’s ok and using the Spirit Severing Technique to protect the Master and anyone else from bad spirits. The only other person who can do that is a Shaman that banishes bad spirits, and the closest ones are over in Nine Tails Vale.

Pearl finally makes up her mind up after dinner, sneaking over while balancing some soup on a tray before moving into the room and bringing it with her. Mr. Nick is in a bundle on the bed, and she says quietly, “Mr. Nick, I have soup for you.”

Mr. Nick is quiet a long moment before he moves, sitting up a bit and Pearl sees now why Mystic Maya said he was sick. Mr. Nick is really pale and looks horrible, his hair all messy and his face scratchy from the stubble that’s grown.

“Pearls…”

“I was worried, and Mystic Maya said you were sick, and I wanted to...I’m sorry.”

He manages a weak smile. “It’s ok. I don’t think you’ll get sick from what I have. I just...have had bad experiences with colds.”

Pearl understands - the first time she’d gotten a cold, it was icky and Mama wasn’t happy with her at all so she had to start training even more. She’d gotten all stuffy and had to take medicine that tasted bad, and as she glances back, she sees Mr. Nick taking one of the pills he’d been taking when Mystic Maya had been taken away. He looks a bit better afterwards, but not enough to stop Pearl from worrying anyway.

“Do you need more pills? Mama gave me tea when I was sick, and icky medicine.”

Mr. Nick looked over at her in surprise and fear, making Pearl blink and wonder what was going on, before he slumped, looking very tired. “No...not yet. I’ll be fine until I get home, Pearls. Thank you for your concern.”

She watches him eat, wanting to make sure he’s ok, and when he does look a bit better after a long moment, she hopes that the pills will make him feel much better and let him come out to play, or visit or whatever he wants to do. She can stay inside, even if playing in the snow is so much fun, if it means Mr. Nick is better.

January 14, 2018

Miles Edgeworth is currently getting more and more upset with all the ways he has to prove he’s himself, as well as doing so without alerting Franziska or Lisbeth about his continued existence. He’s also is hoping that Gumshoe will stop calling him every other day in order to ask if he’s coming back and that it’s really important he does because Wright looked horrible yesterday and…

Edgeworth lets out a growl of frustration and then takes in a breath, hoping to calm down. He knows that he has to hurry, he knows that every day spent away from Phoenix, without rebuilding at least some of that trust or connection he once had, would be bad for Phoenix’s health.

Gumshoe texting him images he managed to take didn’t help either. Edgeworth had a sneaking suspicion that if Salmone Hari ever got his number, he’d never hear the end of it. Granted, if Franziska ever got his number and learned he was alive…

Edgeworth did his best to focus as Fressia came up, trying to not think of a way to tell her that he needed to leave now. She and her husband had pushed for him to be patient, even knowing that he was going to worry about Phoenix as the end of the year got closer and closer. He had to hope that Phoenix would live long enough for Edgeworth to return and reconcile with him, or at least reconnect in some way. Gumshoe had said that Marilyn wasn’t sure if it was possible, but as she and Edgeworth acknowledged, there was no real way of knowing that much about the connection. The particular trait that allowed Marilyn to do what she did was different from Phoenix, but it was also different from all the others that everyone knew. It was so different that Edgeworth could only hope his gut feeling, that returning and reconnecting the lost connection, would be enough to keep him at least around.

“The papers are all ready, so all that remains is getting back to LA without Mother causing a fuss,” Fressia said, sitting down and passing Edgeworth some tea as he looked over some of the cases he was working from home. He couldn’t be back on the schedule that von Karma had him on, and he didn’t want to do that either. He was going to work on changing things, and that meant he was going to deal more in paperwork and handing off cases to competent prosecutors. “Miles…”

“I’m working on the transfer to get Blackquill over to LA,” he told her simply, “and to see about transferring the Cykes to the same branch. She’s a valuable person to have around, and her work on psychology is going to help out when it comes to prosecution and finding the right person to arrest. Plus, apparently Blackquill doesn’t want to leave her daugther alone.” He’s quiet as he looks at the report on the girl, who was home-schooled and registered as a null, but always wore special earmuffs yet complained of loud noises. It would probably be something he shouldn’t encourage, but if Blackquill could make her life better, then he was fine with it and would work to help them out. He didn’t want a repeat of what happened to Phoenix or Marilyn or anyone else to happen to this little girl.

“And you’re pushing yourself again. I know you aren’t fragile, but you also have only recently started showing yourself to a few people to prove you’re not dead. We’ll be in LA soon…”

He put the paperwork down, letting out a long sigh. “Phoenix is getting worse. Marilyn and Gumshoe suspect that he’ll be at his worse when I...when I wanted to jump. Gumshoe said that he heard Phoenix truly believes I’m dead. Marilyn thought that what she was cutting off was small, inconsequential, but it was much deeper. I can’t let him die, Fressia. I can’t...I don’t think I’ll be able to recover from that.”

“I know you can’t. I just wish you’d contact Franziska. She might be heavy-handed, but she would make sure that he’s cared for and would do her best to protect him,” Fressia said, bringing up a recent argument she’d started with him, “She needs to know, Miles.”

“She will. But I’m also worried she’ll only push Phoenix over the edge, or not push enough. She was worried when he fainted, and she’s gotten harder in her work to win the cases she’s given. I want her to at least calm down and not take Manfred’s path, but I can’t just go in and stop her everytime she goes too far. I have enough problems, and she needs to learn on her own.”

Fressia let out a breath. “I agree to a point. But you still should call her.”

Edgeworth looked back at the papers. “I’m going for dramatic.”

Fressia let out a frustrated sigh. “You’re not, and you know it. You just want to avoid Mother for as long as you can.”

“Considering she’s been harassing Phoenix, yes, I do.” Edgeworth sat back and looked over at Fressia. “Franziska will end up telling Lisbeth, if not to spite her then to at least let her know. And Lisbeth will take great pride in letting Phoenix know. I’ll take whatever reaction Phoenix gives me when I return over him learning from Lisbeth a month in advance.” He sighs. “I know what I’m doing, Fressia. I’m not like I was a year ago. I might still have issues with what happened to me, or might find it hard to make small talk, but I am ready to get back into prosecuting. And I have enough pull that I can work on changing the system, on making it actually work instead of just having the illusion of working.”

His step-sister is quiet for a long moment, studying him, before she says, “Alright. Get back to LA the moment you can, Miles. I’ll be here for you, if you need me.”

?????
January 26, 2018

6:15pm

Phoenix is grateful that he’s been alone for the anniversary of that day, that Salmone is busy elsewhere and that no one comes into the office while he’s doing his best to avoid both the main office room as well as anywhere else he can think of. He’d call Maya to have her schedule a visit or something, but he doesn’t want her to ask what’s wrong, and getting away from LA seems out of the question. He’s too fatigued to do anything, the whole day playing out like some old record on repeat, playing loudly in a room down the hall and without anyone to stop it.

When his arm feels bad, and he wakes up with a nose-bleed after passing out from the sudden return of feelings from the night Mia was killed, enough to almost see the whole thing again, and without any way to stop the pounding migraine that had engulfed all of his mind, Phoenix finally seeks out Eldoon. Even if the price is higher and it will cost him enough that he’ll start to worry about bills, Wright has to get those pills if he wants to stay upright. He needs them to keep everything in place, to stop his powers from erupting out and taking out anyone else. He’s been careful enough with them, taking a few more pills when he was at Kurain or spending more time with Maya and Pearls so they wouldn’t be pulled into the same pain he’d caused him or her, but he also knew from experience that the next few months were going to be hard for him to reign in his power, to not take those pills.

He needed to be alive long enough to see that event they’d been invited to. After that, he could let go. Damn Powers for sending us those invitations!

He pushed the angry thoughts away when his power rumbled and rolled, pushing against the cracks of the blasted space. It looked more like a lava-flow instead of a tundra, the heat rolling off in areas while in others, it steamed from where that hole in his mind still was, the one that he had left a year ago, when the pain had become so strong that not even Phoenix could warm it from the ice cold glacier it had been. That had been Phoenix’s fault, that he’d unbalanced his friend so much the result had been this. At least when his time came to an end, it would cause fewer people to suffer.

Maya and Pearls will be sad…

“What are you doin’ here?” Eldoon’s voice cut through his thoughts, and Phoenix looked up at him, feeling unsteady on his feet and out of place in his own skin. “You need to be at a clinic, boy.”

“No…no clinic, please.” He can hardly stand it when Eldoon tries to diagnose him, and with his powers reacting as they are now, he’ll hurt someone badly and he can’t do that. “I just…I need more pills.”

At least Eldoon doesn’t look disgusted at his confession, just crosses his arms and looks at him. “Those aren’t going to keep you going for long.”

Phoenix takes in a shaky breath and tries to keep his head clear. “They’ll keep me up until March. That’s all I need. Please, I…I can’t…” he doesn’t want to say anything about how much he wants to go the bridge and jump, to pull off his skin until there’s nothing left, to stop himself from hurting people. He holds out a hand to Eldoon, the only way he can think of pleading despite his fear. “I need them, please.”

Eldoon lets out a huff, the bowl covering his forehead as he thinks before moving to reach into his cart, pulling out two large vials of the pills that looked like Fever Reducers and holding them up for Phoenix to see. “This is the last of it. It’ll take me a bit to make more.”

Phoenix swallowed back his reply that he wouldn’t need more, but instead nodded his understanding. The two would cost him, and he was ready to at least pay whatever Eldoon wanted if it meant he managed to stay sane until the big “Hero of Heroes” Grand Prix that Will had invited them to in a month or two. Maya and Pearls were too happy about the invitations to have him disappear now, let alone have it color their month with sadness. If Will hadn’t sent out those invitations, he would have done his best to endure today, made his excuses, and taken a trip when no one was watching. Now, he had to take the pills, and hope they lasted him until just after the Grand Prix.

Eldoon handed them over after Phoenix handed over the money he had gotten, happy he’d been able to pay the essentials and resigning himself to probably not having a working phone for that month, and the heating wouldn’t be on, but he could make do. Not to mention that Charlie, the office plant, was pretty hardy and well-watered. He just hoped no one asked about the sudden lack of funds.

Not that anyone cares.

“You still need a clinic,” Eldoon told him as Phoenix downed two pills dry, shuddering a bit as his powers buckled against the hold but calmed down, his senses drowned in ice and water and something else to keep everything out. “You’re not gonna last with those, not at the rate you take ‘em at times.”

“I’ll be fine for now,” Phoenix said simply, shivering a bit at how cold he felt inside but not focusing on it. He wasn’t going to leave until after the Grand Prix, until after he’d made sure that Maya and Pearls were happy and not focused on him. He just needed that, and then he could go away and not bother anyone again.

“Are you gonna ask for more?” Eldoon asked, frowning at him as Phoenix put the pills away and started to leave. Phoenix looked back at him and then let out a huff, wishing the old man hadn’t said anything.

“I need to see if I can without going broke. I’ll need a case first,” Phoenix told him, instead of the truth. “Thank you for your concern...but I’ll be fine.”

If he kept saying that, it might even be true.

March 20, 2018

7:42pm

Gatewater Hotel - Viola Hall

The quiet before the big reveal was almost loud, the excitement and tension raising enough to cut through every bit of wall that Phoenix had put up, the ice and tundra starting to crack and melt in the face of it, and the rolling heat of his powers bubbling up at the excitement as the announcer built up the appearance of the Hero of Heroes, everyone watching as they introduced the various masked heroes before a new voice cut in, the paper moon replica cut down as the new member of the Steel Samurai jumped down, twirling a long spear as everyone looked surprised, the banner behind him reading “Hero of Heroes Superhero”.

Maya and Will cheered loudly at the Nickel Samurai’s win, getting Pearls to cheer as well, even if she doesn’t know which is which. Will is doing good, and is obviously glad to give them a chance to experience everything. He’s no longer the Steel Samurai - the success of it and the spinoff, the Pink Princess, meant that the new series, the Nickel Samurai, was just as popular and even lasting longer than just the one season that it’s first two went through.

He barely pays attention to what Maya and Will are saying about the Nickel Samurai and the main rival, the Jammin’ Ninja, from the rival network. Maya seems perplexed by a missing bit, and Will is explaining that the two actors have some sort of rivalry going on.

Nick gets up and points to show he’s heading for the bathroom, leaving the group to talk as he walks through one corridor. One side, nearest the bathrooms, has a ton of flowers and teddy bears, while the other side is near-barren, having only two wreaths that were sent by the production company. He ignores them, though the teddy bears are a bit confusing to see, as he goes into the bathroom to take one of his last pills.

He has four left, and while he should take more, and has been, he also knows he can’t risk it right now. The four have to get him through tonight and tomorrow, and after that he can finish things.

He pauses as he’s heading back, not sure why his mind feel so focused on the door with the flowers and teddy bears, his mind seeming to want to latch onto something but unable to, and he couldn’t figure out what.

Shaking his head, Phoenix headed back to the group, frowning as Will handed them a pass to the next event, something about the Nickel Samurai having a big ‘confession’ of some sort. He wasn’t sure he could handle this again, but Maya wanted to see it, and Pearls was still too happy about everything to be quiet, and so they headed over to the other hall, Maya still happy over the win and that they were invited to such a place. Will Powers was still amazed at how much Maya managed to put away, and Pearls had been overwhelmed by the choices after mostly having salad to eat.

The Hotel Lobby was already packed with seats and the main stage, cameras pointed in that direction, and they were going to find their seat as the sound system changed from the soft-rock instrumental thing they always used to an announcement.

“Your attention please. Your attention please. The Nickel Samurai’s Post-Ceremony Stage Show will not be held tonight due to unforeseen circumstances.”

“WHAT? WHY?” Maya yelled, getting Phoenix to wince at her volume.

“The police are asking for everyone’s cooperation at this time, so please stay where you are. Again, the police have made a special request that you cooperate and stay where you are.”

Everyone froze at the announcement, Phoenix wondering what was going on that the Police would have to be here.

“D-do you want me to go check out what’s going on?” Will asked, Phoenix shifting as he looked around, the sudden surprise and dread from so many in the hotel seeming to seep into him as he reminded himself he couldn’t take another pill just yet.

“Um, wait, I’ll come with you.”

“FREEZE!” the familiar voice, even though it was muffled by a helmet, made Phoenix stop and turn with Will. “You two null-skulls! Didn’t you hear the announcement just now? It just finished telling you not to move! You think you own the place now, don’t you? Now that you can come into a place like this when some of us can’t even keep a job ‘cause of you?”

“Ms. Oldbag?” Maya asked, sounding both annoyed and confused, “What are you doing here?”

“What do you think? I’m security here! Can’t you tell either, or has bein’ with these nulls dulled your senses as well? I was doing well until Global began to cut people out, and because of him,” she glared at Phoenix, who shifted a bit, “I almost worked as a body guard - I would’ve loved to take care of that high-level in the red coat and frills. But he said that the arrangement would be ‘too troublesome’ for him. Imagine! As if being around some null was less trouble than having me make sure he was ok! What did I ever do to deserve such a brush-off when that guy, who had no business talking to you, gave you the time of day, huh?”

Phoenix let out a breath as he glanced at Maya, who seemed ready to lay into Oldbag for being here and giving him trouble. “We’re going back to Viola Hall. It’s where we were first, so if the police have any questions, they can find us there.”

The group left to the hallway, though Powers stayed behind to take his seat and wait it out, since Oldbag was, once again, ignoring him. Maya glanced around, as if expecting to see whatever had brought the police to the place. Phoenix was betting on a murder, but he wasn’t about to ask Oldbag for confirmation.

“Ok, no one’s here, let’s go see if we can find out what happened!”

“Maya, I don’t think--.”
“Excuse me.” A voice said, getting the group to look over at the bellboy who’d come up to where they were. Phoenix frowned when he saw him, wondering at how odd the man looked as well as how terrifying, with what appeared to be a scar running down the center of his head. What was worse was the way he seemed to tilt his head at Phoenix, as if confused by his gaze only briefly before something like recognition or understanding flashed briefly, then was replaced by the same butler-stoic appearance that he and most other bellboys at such posh establishments mastered, as the man looking back at Maya. “Are you, by chance, Maya Fey?”

Chapter Text

Gatewater Hotel

8 pm

His job was done, but the fact that his client was arrested proved a problem. Luckily, he was able to spot a lawyer quickly, talking to a lineage Shaman that he got the name of easily. “Maya Fey” was a lineage of the Kurain School, so her having a phone call would be easily enough to pull off. He’s a bit surprised when he finally spots the lawyer with her.

Phoenix Wright...he’d been one of the ones they’d looked into, and apparently he was half-dead from what looked like a sort of severing of a strong mental bond, or at least a very bad fraying of it. That his family still had such a trait was foolish, and showed how tainted they were. At least his family had recognized what they had, and begun to search for it centuries before the lineages and high-levels noticed and searched for it now. They could tell another one of their kind when they saw one, and he assessed the half-dead man in front of him evenly and easily before he approached.

They needed a lawyer - this one would do well. If he was a null and declared to a lineage, taking the lineage would at least keep his power over him. Either way, he needed a swift trial, one that would allow them to shift the blame from his client, and after that, he could see about taking the lawyer. Whatever his talents, they could keep him around long enough to breed and carry on that power, before his mind finally collapsed on itself and his body died. Maybe they could keep him longer - at least one of the newest generation was birthed from someone who’d gotten a severed connection, months after their mind had gone while their body was kept alive enough to create new life. And that one showed a great deal of potential.

“Miss Fey, you have a phone call,” he said simply, letting her ponder who it could be as Wright continued to give him an odd look, though he apparently cut it down because none of the others were. Yet another one of theirs, forced to pretend. It was why he enjoyed his power to not be noticed, far more than his ability to strangle some powerful person who thought themselves untouchable dead with his bare hands. Tonight, he’d used a scarf because it had been handy, and very ironic for a ‘hero’ to die by that, but for now, he’d have to push that thought away and focus on what he was to do.

“This way, please,” he said when Miss Fey agreed to take the call, waiting until they were nearing the lobby and alone before putting her in a sleeper hold. The girl hardly struggled before passing out, and he put her where he could easily get to her when everything was all done, before he briefly focused on the space where Wright was, using that energy to focus on the transceiver before he went on his way. The moment Wright touched it, he’d be marked, and he would be able to monitor his progress and get him later on.

Hotel Lobby

Phoenix jumped when the receiver went off, something cold seeming to spike through his hand. Pearls sees him jump before she hears the sound, and looks over at him with clear worry written over his face. Will had gone to check for Maya, and the stress of hearing about a murder was not helping Phoenix or Will, and he didn’t doubt that Maya would push him into take the Nickel Samurai’s case.

The thing was...he wouldn’t. He wasn’t about to take a case when he has so few pills left. He could easily pass it on to Gavin or someone else - Gavin would probably welcome a high-profile case like this one.

But the moment Maya’s voice came over the receiver, scared and obviously confused, he felt himself stiffen as his powers boiled underneath the renewed shields, attempting to waken like they had over a year ago, when facing down von Karma and his taser.

“Maya?”

“So, Mr. Wright. Wouldn’t you agree that the more important issue to my identity is the fact of the girl?”

Phoenix tried to keep from panicking, but Pearl was already in a panic, and it didn’t help him anyway. Maya’s in danger again…

“Maya! Where are you? Are you hurt?” Don’t be hurt, please, I can’t save you this time if you’re…

“Come now. Don’t fall apart on me so soon.” His power was pounding at him, the ice seeming to solidify with it and dig further into his head and only adding to the pounding pain. Phoenix had to sit as the voice over the receiver continued, “Now that I have your attention, I have a modest proposal for you. I understand you have little time, but I trust we won’t...ignite...any problems, will we?”

He knows, he knows and he has Maya and...and…

“If you do this one thing, I’ll return this valuable ‘item’ unharmed...what is this called again, in your fancy terms? Just so I know you’re still with me.”

He needed a pill, he needed to focus, he needed Maya to be safe…

“‘Kidnapping for ransom’,” Phoenix answered back hollowly, his whole being feeling numb. He’d take that over the heat buildup that threatened him a moment ago. It didn’t stop his sight from going, and Phoenix from sitting heavily in the chair as his vision darkened. Pearls was crying to one side, upset, and he wished he could tell her to calm down, that they needed to remain strong for Maya, but his whole body felt cold suddenly, no heat reaching him, making him feel detached from everything even as his mind buckled and screamed in pain over everything, the ice as well as what was going on. It was a side effect of the pills, making him feel more like a wind-up toy and emotionless, while at the same time realizing how badly this was affecting his body and his mind when the drug finally began to wear out.. All he could think was that he had to listen, and hope the demand wasn’t too steep.

“Are you there, Mr. Wright?”

“What do you want?” Wright asked, “Considering what I am, I don’t have a lot of money, as you guessed.”

“Very good, Mr. Attorney. You have a good grasp of the situation. You’re right, I don’t need your money. I doubt you have any left. What I do want is a certain verdict. I would like a complete acquittal.”

“And what have  you..” Phoenix stopped, “What’s your client done to get such a service?”

“...very good again, Mr. Attorney. I am not the person you’ll be representing. You know about the events at the Gatewater, since you’re currently there, correct?”

“Yes. I take it I’m to represent Mr. Engarde?”

“And obtain a full acquittal for him. Indeed. You are on point today, Mr. Wright. Almost makes me envious for the...precautions...you’ve been taking.” Phoenix is quiet, the man going on. “Mr. Engarde did not kill anyone. Of that you can be sure of. However…”

“However what?” Phoenix asked, his calm starting to break as the feeling of his powers came back, his own fears over what the man was saying, what he implied he knew, starting to break through the chemical he’d taken and become too used to.

“Someone is framing him for murder. They’re being very clever about it, as well. You can believe me or not, but a few facts are simple enough. I have your precious ‘item’, and you have two days. At the trial in two days, you will win the Not Guilty verdict you are so known for. Oh, and since I am in the role of kidnapper, it stands to reason...don’t call the cops, or even tell the cops, of what’s going on.”

Phoenix felt himself squeezing the receiver a bit tightly, glaring at it as he finally growled out. “Who the hell are you?”

“Well...I can tell you that much. My name is...de Killer.”

With that, the receiver went dead.

Pearls was still crying, claiming it to be her fault for not going with Maya, that she should have been there, and Phoenix fails miserably at trying to keep her calm or say it wasn’t her fault.

It’s all mine...it’s mine that they all die, that they’re hurt...I should have ended it after that trial, and no one would have been hurt…

--

Gumshoe at least waits until he has a break to call Mr. Edgeworth about the case. “Sir, please, ya gotta come for this one!”

“I’m already back in LA, what more--”

“Mr. Wright’s takin’ the case, and he looks terrible! I’m amazed he’s still standin’! Marilyn said he shouldn’t be at all. Sir, why are you takin so long gettin here?” He tells himself he’s not angry, but after seeing how Mr. Wright was today and hearing what he was going through…

“I’m going through a lot of red-tape. I’m angry about it as well, Detective. But I’ll be there tomorrow for the briefing on the case, and ready to take care of anything.”

He breathed a sigh of relief, glad that Mr. Edgeworth would be here so Mr. Wright could tell him what was going on and they could work on getting back Maya Fey from the bad guy that had her. He couldn’t keep this a secret, not with the case like this, and wanted to make sure the two at least got back to where whatever was hurting Mr. Wright was no longer hurting him. Marilyn had said it was something bad, and was upset over what happened, but she couldn’t fix it and hadn’t realized how deep it was.

“It’s like trying to pull up something, and not realizing how deep the roots went,” she told him, “when I stopped the link, so Mr. Edgeworth could go away, I didn’t think. I thought it was just a small link, not...what it was. I didn’t realize what I’d done, and now…”

If Gumshoe hadn’t seen him and if Lotta hadn’t run off to do whatever while all angry over not being let in to see the murder, he would’ve told Mr. Wright to sit down and relax. He’s pretty sure Lotta was ready to do the same thing, or at least is just as worried.

“I’ll see you tomorrow, Detective.”

Gumshoe just hoped it wouldn’t be too late.

March 21, 2018
Gatewater Hotel

Phoenix is glad that his client is innocent of murder, but at the same time, he can’t shake the odd feelings he’s gotten off of him, nor the fact that he seemed so confused when Phoenix finally blurted out that deKiller wanted Phoenix as his lawyer. He’s not sure why, but something about Engarde throws him off even more than Gavin does, and it’s enough to make him seriously rethink taking his pill, but with only four left, he has to get through a trial and hope that the kidnapper is right. Not to mention that just thinking about a pill makes the ice-spike in his mind twist and pull, like a hook sunk into flesh, and he is lucky that Pearl doesn’t notice the small cut it created, though Phoenix has to resort to bandages to keep the bleeding under control.

He’s not surprised that Gumshoe is ready to help them out when they get to Corrida’s room - even though they’re technically not on the same side, Gumshoe has always been helpful when things look bad for Phoenix or even when they’re working towards the same goal. He’d been helpful even back when White had had him arrested, and done all he could to help out during his trial. And though the kidnapper had said to not tell the police, Phoenix trusted Gumshoe to not bring it up, though the ice spike twists pretty badly when he’d told him, and even now, talking to him just casually without mentioning Maya, it’s there and trying to give him a migraine.

Phoenix isn’t surprised that he’s quick to allow him to look around, where some others hadn’t been, and he’s just as happy that Frank is also giving him space and letting him work. His mind still isn’t clear, but he can focus at least on what he needs to do, and Engarde’s lack of Psyche-locks when asked about the murder means he isn’t the murderer, at least…

Then why do I feel like he has something else to hide? Why am I so sure that he’s not really innocent?

It helps that the crime scene didn’t make sense in the context of what happened. He can feel the residual panic and fear, and he recognizes the phantom feelings from the night before, when he’d gone to take the pill to calm himself down and keep him sane and alive. His guilt over what’s going on triples and he lets out a breath, trying to focus himself. The final emotions from Corrida and whoever found him are muddled because of how deep he’s pushed his powers, but they’re also strong enough to know that the second person who came here did want to frame Engarde. The question is why, and how they framed him.

“Thank you for helping us, Gumshoe,” Phoenix says as he slowly stands, doing his best to not touch anything as Pearls and Gumshoe watch him, both looking worried for different reasons. At least they weren’t giving off the cold, calculating look that Adrian Andrews put on, though he’d noticed her emotions being almost as tightly wound as his own were, enough that he would have guessed she was like him, had it not been for her high-normal pin she wore, denoting her as a Pharmakon. She was still in a job that isn’t quite what most think of a Pharmakon job says a lot about her, though she hadn’t taken Phoenix’s pin, which showed him to be a null, as a sign that they had something in common.

“I just hope we don’t run into Miss von Karma. She’ll have my hide if she knows I’m helpin’ you out.”

“Is von Karma the prosecutor for this one too?”

Gumshoe looked sad as Frank said, “She jumped on it before you were the defense attorney, if that helps.”
“Not really.”

Frank let out a sigh. “She’s ok, just...intense. And I’m pretty sure her being only 18 means that she hasn’t figured out how to express herself. Well, that and having her parents as ‘role models’.”

Phoenix didn’t particularly feel like empathizing or even trying to empathize with Franziska von Karma, now or anytime in the near-future. He was going to be out of her life soon, and maybe then she could move on to bothering someone else so her record would be ‘perfect’.

He’s not surprised when a beeping sound announces the arrival of von Karma, but he is a bit annoyed that it means she decides to whip him as well as Gumshoe and Frank. Frank glares at her after he’s gotten hit, and Phoenix can tell that the whip will leave a good-sized bruise on his arm and side that she managed to hit. Pearl glares at her as the older almost-adult (Phoenix remembers being 18, he knows it’s nowhere near being an adult) goes after Gumshoe and Frank for helping out Phoenix, glaring at them and almost whipping Gumshoe again as Frank finally directed him out, saying, “We’ll see you at the briefing, Prosecutor.”

--

Ambrose Frank was being far too formal with her, and she hated it, because she knew why he was doing that as well, and the reason was standing in front of her, shielding a small girl from her view, and not evening bothering to glare at her, just looking tired and sad. Mostly, though, it was because she simply was not in the mood to have Phoenix Wright as the defense attorney for this case. She’d take anyone, even Kristoph Gavin, over Wright.

She’d learned more about Phoenix Wright’s ancestry than she’d ever cared to, including the fact that his grandmother had been brutally murdered and the killer not brought up because of prosecutors not wanting to take the case against a high-level who brutalized everyone anyway; that his father had been the town drunk who’d been allowed to beat him and torment him mentally because the police wouldn’t handle things and always had some excuse for him; and that the few big cases he’d taken up, against either Miles Edgeworth or her father, had been ones where the corruption ran so deep it was still sprouting back up in their system, still trying to find a foothold again, and still making it so cases like this would test everything she’s working for.

She hated it, because it meant that the system she believed in, her perfect job and the perfect thing she worked for, that her father had told her was perfection when he’d finally decided she would follow in his footsteps, after weeks of begging and showing off how perfect she could be - it had failed Phoenix Wright, and he now seemed to be exacting his final revenge upon her childish beliefs by beating her at every turn, just as he’d bested Miles before saving him and beating him again. If he was here, the pattern only served that Engarde was innocent of murder, though there might be another skeleton in his closet. And yet, for all that she could do, had done, would do to keep the man that her brother had cared for, had fought Father for in multiple ways, ending with that showdown in the prosecutor’s lobby...now, that man before her looked pale, ill, and like he couldn’t get enough sleep. She knew he had to have illegal drugs on him, but she also didn’t trust herself to confiscate them when it was likely that was all that was keeping him upright for the case.

She doesn’t know why she does it, but she glares at him, straightening and glaring at him. She wants him to react, damn it! He showed her only a glimpse of what he once was, of how he could fight someone like her father and win, even after Miles Edgeworth had confessed to murder, and yet...he looked beaten and defeat and…

And like he’s going to follow my brother over that cliff.

“You ruined my perfect record, and I will never forgive you for that!” I won’t forgive you for making me realize all that I’ve been told is a lie, I won’t forgive you for making me see how foolish I was, and I won’t forgive you for breaking Miles Edgeworth’s heart, no matter what really happened.

“This time...victory is mine!” I will beat you, I will show you that I can be right, that I am not simply a shadow of my brother and father. I will show you that prosecutors can be good, can actually put a criminal away instead of leaving them to hurt others for so long!

Phoenix Wright looked at her with eyes so blank that she might as well have spoken to one of the stuffed bears that littered the room, and his voice sounded both robotic and harsh at the same time, as if he couldn’t believe what she’d just said.

“...victory is yours? That’s all you care about? Is that all this means to you?”

“W-what?”

He didn’t answer her, or challenge her, or anything else. He didn’t even show the brief flash of pain or anger he had, that day at the circus when she’d claimed Miles Edgeworth would return.

He’s already followed Miles over that cliff...then why is he on this case? What more does he have to prove?

Angry and unnerved by Wright’s inaction and his words, she let out a huff and went to join Frank and Gumshoe, Frank’s glare being the only thing that stayed her whip. She pulled on it instead, the nervous habit she picked up from the days with her riding crop and when she finally graduated to the whip carrying over as she fumed.

“You’re no longer allowed to talk to Wright in private,” Frank finally announced as they got to the car.

“Shut up.”

He let out an angry huff. “We all saw how bad things were, von Karma. If you’re not going in there with at least a speech ready, don’t go--.”

“I said shut up,” she growled out at him as she got into the car and slammed the door. Frank is quiet and long moment, glancing over at Gumshoe, who is currently looking anywhere but at them. He’s on thin enough ice when Franziska’s temper and inability to say what she wants to gets in her way, and aiding the defense is only going to get him tossed out. Enough of the old-guard are still angry at him for taking Edgeworth’s side and helping to put her father in prison, let alone what happened with Gant and Skye. He’s only there because she said he was important, and now, seeing him helping out Wright without any real reason to do so...she knows the next time, she’ll have to fire him.

“Just...take us to the briefing.”

Franks doesn’t say anything, but she’s guessing he knows how bad things are, or has an idea. She just wishes they’d caught it earlier, or had a way to deal with it.

She’d told Maya Fey that she’d go to help the Fey Clan, if her mother bothered Phoenix Wright again. Apparently, nothing was able to save him.

Chapter Text

Criminal Affairs Department

The meeting is so swift that the ‘special investigator’ that they asked come in to help hasn’t arrived, and that means that Gumshoe slipped out without anyone noticing, at least he thinks. von Karma follows discreetly, not needing to hear the rest of the briefing - they have everything they need to make the case stick, so there’s no point in listening to whatever some investigator or whoever wants to tell them when he’s only looking at photos and the evidence after the fact.

“...looking into that as well.”

“The scandal with Mr. Corrida?” Phoenix Wright asks, looking confused as he reads from a tabloid, “Why?”

“Well...two years ago, a woman...committed suicide.”

Wright tenses a bit and the little girl next to him looks surprised, gasping at Gumshoe as he explains who she was and why they were investigating it as well.

What is he doing!? His career is on the line! Why is he risking it for Wright? They aren’t good friends! They’re hardly friends!

Franziska storms up as Gumshoe explains more, the monitoring device she put in his coat going off as she got close enough to whip him, the punishment not enough to take off her anger at everything. She sees Wright move the little girl out of the way, and she suddenly is even angrier. How dare he think she’d ever attack a child!

“I’m getting sick of dealing with one foolish idiot after another,” she growled out, stalking up as Gumshoe looked on with fright, frozen in place as Wright stood his ground, at least looking a bit better but not by much. “You can’t seem to stop allying yourself with the enemy, can you? I don’t need a traitor in my midst!” She pointed at Gumshoe, who looked upset but still frozen by fear. “Y-you...you don’t mean…”

“You have thirty minutes to get out of here,” she said, her anger at him taking this chance when his job, his one livelihood, was on the line, “You are no longer needed. Goodbye.”

“Th-that’s…” the little girl started, rolling up her sleeves and looking almost ready to throw a spell, as Gumshoe protested, “W-wait, please wait, sir! If I don’t get this month’s pay, I’ll sta--”

“QUIET, SCRUFFY!” she yelled, “If it weren’t for...for traitors like you--.”
“‘I would’ve won.’” The familiar voice should make her freeze, but with her eyes on Wright, the little girl, and Scruffy, it does something else.

Phoenix Wright doesn’t look like he’s seen a ghost, or anything that would answer for the voice that spoke quietly at her back. He looks, instead, like he’s seeing some sick parody of the man behind her. He looks angry, not happy, not elated, not joyful or sorrowful or anything else welling up in Franziska right now.

“Is that what you want to say, Franziska?” Miles Edgeworth asks from behind her, standing with the documents for tomorrow’s case and looking at her with both anger and pity in his eyes. Behind him, Fressia is standing as well, looking upset over something, but Franziska isn’t about to ask her sister why she’s unhappy.

“It’s been a long year, Wright,” Edgeworth says to Wright, who still hasn’t said anything to him and seems unable to stop himself from shaking. “We need to talk.”

“We’re doing no such thing.”

Everyone’s eyes are suddenly on Wright, because Franziska has never heard something growl like he just did, sounding like a wounded animal that had been cornered for too long and was now expected to accept a helping hand. She doubts anyone else has heard that either, and it’s enough to even surprise the little girl and make her look up at him. “Mr. Nick?”

Edgeworth doesn’t get any closer, at least, but instead looks at him and crosses his arms. He says to Franziska, “You’re still blaming others for when things don’t go your way. You haven’t changed a bit...it’s troubling.”

She glares at him, though he’s not looking at her. “You…” Wright is still far away from him, still looking at him with mistrust and hurt, and she finally says, “How dare you show your face without a shred of shame on it!?”

“Still angry about the von Karma creed? And how are you maintaining it? I heard you’re having a rough time being ‘perfect in every way’.”

He’s baiting her, and she’s angry enough to raise to it, cracking the whip near him but not against him. She isn’t about to hurt him at this time. Instead, she says, “Run away with your tail between your legs like the ill-bred high-power you are!”

He looked like he deserved that, and he still hadn’t taken his eyes off Wright. She’s fine with that, but she’s not happy that Wright looks upset and uncomfortable with the attention, or that Gumshoe looks ready to get between them and give Wright the time to leave without having spoken to Edgeworth.

“You seemed to be getting crushed under the weight of it all, Franziska,” he said, as if that allowed him to keep looking at Wright, “That’s one of the reasons I came back.”

“I’m not giving you this case!” she finally yelled out, cracking her whip again. That at least got Wright to relax a bit. “I’m not about to give in, and certainly not to you!” She turned back to Wright. “I will see you tomorrow...in court. I am going to make it a clinical lesson in the meaning of ‘total victory’.”

He didn’t say anything, but was clenching his fist so tight it made her worried. She strode off anyway, ready to go prepare for her trial, and pushing past Fressia as she did.

Fressia would only be there if she was making sure Miles Edgeworth was alright...meaning she’d known where Miles was this entire time, and not told Franziska. She didn’t deserve her attention.

I am going to keep Miles away from him, until he learns to not just expect to come back and return to his old life in such a manner!

--

Miles is struck by the realization that he should’ve listened to Gumshoe’s frantic calls, instead of trying to play it safe. He should have done something, left some hint, but he’d never really thought that Wright would look at him like he wasn’t actually himself, but some demon posing as Miles Edgeworth.

He knows why he’s looking at him like that too, but knowing and seeing were two very different things.

Marilyn Hari had split a connection between them, and Phoenix had only felt Edgeworth’s last thoughts - of jumping from Dusky Bridge. Paired with the note he’d left, it meant that Phoenix had believed, wholeheartedly, that he was dead.

He’d come back to ensure that he could get a new job, that he wouldn’t have the heavy load that had sent him into a deep depression, and that had resulted in at least one Payne losing their hair prematurely. He wanted to make sure the two people he cared about the most in life were alright.

Now Franziska was probably not about to talk to him until he explained things, and Wright...if he hadn’t been skittish and afraid of touch before, he certainly wasn’t going to let Miles near him to try to repair the damage he’d done.

“You were dead,” Wright finally ground out, as if unable to really bear the silence or the staring that Edgeworth managed, in the hopes of connecting just by sight.

“I was, to some degree,” Edgeworth told him, wanting to be truthful. “I handled a few things...poorly. Coupled with an identity crisis after--.”

“You’re dead, you were dead, and all you can say is that it was ‘handled poorly’?”

Miles is treading ice so thin it’s already breaking, and the little girl that Phoenix seemed to have picked up somewhere, dressed in the same outfit that Maya Fey wore, is staring at him like she’s trying to figure something out.

“Hating me like that is unhealthy,” Miles said, trying a new avenue, “and anyway, I hated myself enough, at the end.”

“It’s not the end, though,” Wright said, “since you came back when you weren’t wanted or needed.”

Miles has no clue how to talk to Wright. He has no idea how to fix this, and he finally looks away. “You can’t win on your own at the trial tomorrow.”

“Why not?”

“Because...it’s going to require the same thing that won the trial against Gant.”

Wright’s glare turns almost murderous, but Edgeworth doesn’t care at this point. He’ll fix everything by the time the trial is done, even if it means Wright hates him afterwards. He can bear that, probably better than Drake Wright ever did.

“You can’t uncover the truth on your own,” Edgeworth tells him, “I can offer some assistance, but only if you ask.”

Wright’s quiet a long moment, but he’s stopped glaring. He hasn’t stopped shaking, and he looks almost like he’s pained as he asks, “When you left...that was over the losses, wasn’t it? Because you didn’t have your ‘perfect record’.”

Miles looks away, not wanting to admit what had been said, what he’d wanted to do, and how he’d simply felt as if there was no way for him to be of any use, not without von Karma’s record to hold him up. Being told point-blank such a thing also didn’t help, especially not coupled with the phrase he so hated.

“It’d be better for everyone if you’d stayed dead,” Wright finally ground out, starting to turn away. Edgeworth had a feeling that letting him leave is the worse idea right now, despite how he looks and is acting.

“Why are you still in the courtroom?”

--

He needs the pills. All he wants to do is run and hide, to down all the pills he has left and damn the consequences, to just...leave.

He died because of me, because I made him lose. Maya’s in trouble because of me, because of what I am.

I can’t do this. I can’t...I’m sorry, Maya.

Edgeworth’s questions catches him short, making him turn back and manage to not look at the thing wearing his old friend’s skin. It can’t be Edgeworth, even if it acts and speaks and remembers all he did. Phoenix is sure the Shaman who’s gifted in banishing or calling spirits is the reason behind this, but he doesn’t want to address her or tell her that if she wanted him gone so badly, she’d only needed to bring Maya here, show she was safe, and have Gavin take the case.

“The courtroom isn’t supposed to be some personal battlefield for prosecutors and lawyers. I’m there to defend my client...to save them.” Like I was saved, for all the good it did her. Like Mia did for me, and I couldn’t do for her.

“People like you, like your mentor and his daughter...the ones who only think of their own ego-driven goals…”

“You only had to give me back that necklace, and everything would’ve been fine.” “I got such a laugh when I got you to where that stupid sweater…” “Why are you even still trying to talk to me? At least Doug and the others had the good sense to listen to what I said, and go to jail for me, and die for me. You fail at all of that, don’t you Feenie?”

“Just die so I can live my life, you failure of a child.”

“...i hate people like that. They’re reprehensible.” Why did you have to be like them?

Edgeworth is quiet before he lets out a sigh, shifting to pull out a thick folder. “Gumshoe...give this to Mr. Wright.”

“Sir?”

“You’re not fired yet,” Edgeworth told him seriously, “and I doubt Mr. Wright will let me near him.”

Wright is quiet and doesn’t agree, Gumshoe looking between them unhappily as he got the file and handed it to Wright. He frowned as he saw Celeste Inpax’s name on it. “What’s this?”

“All the information on Celeste Inpax’s suicide, and about the one riddle of her death.” He looked away as he said, “Inpax didn’t leave a note. At least, none was found at the scene or anywhere else. The police suspected Mr. Corrida hide it.”

“Why him?” he can do this, he can ask a few questions, because it will help his client, it will find Maya, and then…

“He found the body, and there were traces of ink on her right hand, indicating there was a note.”

Wright draws in a breath, so he can not think about the note he found. He couldn’t have hidden it if he’d tried, not with how he’d been.

“What’s worse is the second part,” Edgeworth said, handing the next file to Gumshoe. Wright blinked when he saw the name, Pearls gasping in surprise, and he quickly gazed over the fact it was an attempted suicide. His powers were rolling and fighting to try to get past his defenses, and the longer he stayed here, the less likely it would be he could stop himself from hurting someone.

“What...why would she…”

“Ms. Andrews has...a co-dependency issue. She’d just lost her mentor to suicide, and had lost the will to live.”

Wright tried to focus on the files, on the case, but this was hitting too close, pulling up too many memories, and he wasn’t about to pull out the pills in front of Gumshoe or the others. Even if Pearls knew, she’d still be worried.

“Andrews is a person who looks for someone she can trust unconditionally, and once she finds that person, she’ll follow them. Without them, she loses all of what she wants to show. Her confidence is just a facade.”

Phoenix remembered the psyche-locks, and what the question he wanted to ask Andrews, before he pushed the reports into his briefcase. He turned to leave, not bothering to thank the thing that was masquerading as Edgeworth, that was making him even think that Edgeworth was alive, and headed for the exit.

“Mr. Nick!”

He slowed, feeling himself sway a bit, and was grateful when he saw a public restroom. “I’m sorry, Pearls, I...I just need…”

“your medicine?” she asked quietly.

“Yeah...please wait here.”

“Ok.”

He felt horrible for lying to her, and even worse as he ducked in, pulling out the vial and looking at the four as his power almost steamed out of the cracks and fissures and melting ice.

He took two, then added a third when his power protested enough to almost make him gag, the sudden spring up of his own emotions as well as the emotions all around him, outsides of the police department and even into the detention center hitting him hard, harder even than days at school when he couldn’t control it, then after he’d left the first time and one of the constants in Phoenix’s life was taken away again.

The third managed to put a new layer over the remaining bit, and Phoenix let out a shaky, gasping breath, watching his hands tremble as they gripped the marble of the bathroom countertops. It’s cracked by the heat, and he pulled away before heading out, hoping he at least looks professional. Pearls is waiting for him, looking worried.

“We need to talk to Ms. Andrews again. Hopefully that will clear a few things up.”

Chapter Text

March 22, 2018

9:45am

District Courthouse

Phoenix looks like he’s about to fall over, and while Mia wants to help him out however she can, she doesn’t want to overstress Pearl either. The fear and emotional turmoil the little girl is going through is bad enough, but seeing Phoenix’s chakras gets her to shift a bit as she tries to figure out what could be done about them. His Fire chakra is nearly-extinguished, though the embers sometimes catch hold and light up, like they’re sparking bits of sawdust or something similar. Metal had dulled and was almost rusting, and all of the others were low, Aether hardly even shined in the way others did, and the lesser ones were all in a state of decay.

“Mia...you don’t have to be here,” he mutters as they wait, their client nearby and apparently not really focusing on events. Mia doesn’t know why, but something about their client reminds her of that woman, the won that had played Phoenix all those years ago, and who’d nearly killed Diego.

“You need support, Phoenix,” she told him simply, “and I want to help. Maya hasn’t been able to call me, and Pearl wants me to be here for you.” She doesn’t mention that Pearl’s fears and worries and guilt have made the strain of channelling someone so far from your age even more deep, because she knows that Pearl is as worried as she is about Phoenix, without having seen the state of his chakras. The only other person she’d ever seen like that was Diego, when she’d gotten Maya to go see him and channel her, just to see if he was alright. It’s almost enough to get her to leave a note for Maya, to watch over Phoenix and ensure he was alright after the case is done.

Phoenix manages a smile, and she watches as he looks back towards the door, waiting for it to open and the trial to start. A sudden, full-body shudder makes her suddenly hyper-aware of something.

None of his chakra’s flare, but it’s obvious they’re fighting something, or that something is making him uncomfortable and hurting him in a way that she can’t locate. He draws in a breath and closes his eyes, seeming to center himself, but seeing that his chakras are so in flux, trying to fight off whatever has caused him pain, she shifts worriedly and watches him.

--

Phoenix expects pain sometimes, especially now when his powers are still eating away at the barriers he’s put up around them and then at themselves or the hole in his mind that Edgeworth left. Even seeing him yesterday, standing like he’d been alive this whole time and acting like his old friend, Phoenix wasn’t sure if he wanted to burn the body or reach out and pull him into a hug.

His anger won out, over anything else, because that thing couldn’t be Edgeworth. Phoenix had felt his friend die, after he’d pushed the last bit of pain onto him through that connection. His power was eating at him, and it had only been the prospect of losing, of never seeing Maya again, that had gotten him out of bed and to the courthouse when his body and mind protested.

It’s already starting…

“Then you’d best get the verdict I want.”

Phoenix had stiffened at the voice, hearing the one that should have been over the transceiver, and then a low chuckle, “Please. I only use those for normal beings. You, though...you and I are far more than these, aren’t we?”

Phoenix had closed his eyes, trying hard to focus and not panic as the voice continued, “I’m not above ensuring that what I tell people is done correctly. I’ve been monitoring you, Mr. Lawyer. You should be glad that no-talent cop you did tell was good enough to help and not hinder your case. You tell anyone else, though, and I won’t be so lenient. While we’re on the subject, I also sent you a ‘present’. It should help with the trial today.”

He’d felt it then, something ripping through his shoulder, and he’d barely managed to hold in his hiss of pain as he tried to get away from the pain and his realization of what he felt.

de Killer had just shot someone, right outside the courthouse, and his power boiled and rolled, trying to reach them. He couldn’t, though - his fear of what would happen, of being thrown out, of what de Killer would to do Maya - kept him in the bench and trying to focus until the doors opened and they were let in, the prosecution missing from the other side of the room.

He didn’t hate von Karma...not like he’d hated her dad. He’d felt, to a point, her anger at Edgeworth but also knew that she believed him alive because she cared deeply for him, in a way that he’d only ever felt from Maya and Mia, or from Salmone when she spoke about her sister. de Killer had shot her in order to make it so Phoenix could get an acquittal.

He’s all but holding onto the bench in front of him in order to stay upright when a voice comes from the prosecutor’s area, walking up to speak to the Judge. “Franziska von Karma is alright. She was taken to a nearby clinic and is recovering.”

The Judge doesn’t seem surprised at his appearance, beyond blinking and nodding his agreement that the thing claiming to be Edgeworth can take control of the Prosecution’s work. Even without the other Shaman with him, Phoenix cannot trust that the thing in front of him is Edgeworth, or even that it will continue to act like the person it’s pretending to be.

I have to win this, to save Maya. I can’t let her be hurt because of me, because of what I am.

Gumshoe comes up when called, looking happy with Edgeworth’s return but unhappy when he states that he’s only a policeman for a short period of time after this. He gave his testimony, and Phoenix was allowed to cross-examine him, Edgeworth raising no objection about it as Phoenix pressed some of Gumshoe’s statements to get more information about the case.

It’s one that isn’t that good for his client, at least at the moment. Edgeworth uses the information to point out that the police would have arrested Engarde only if there was proof, and Gumshoe quickly testifies about that as well.

It’s not something that Phoenix enjoys tearing apart, not because of how good of a friend Gumshoe is, but because it all feels like a trap. The thing masquerading as Edgeworth is acting like his old arrogant self, but he’s also the one holding all the cards and with all the answers. No matter what Phoenix says or tries to prove while speaking to Gumshoe, the only thing he gets out of it is the basics of the murder, why Engarde was arrested, and the proof of his deed.

Whatever the thing holding Edgeworth had learned, it only seemed to succeed in acting like the demon it was, and Phoenix found he couldn’t be angry at it, not for long. It meant that the thing only had Edgeworth’s body and mind...who he was had still died, and after this case, Phoenix could at least be with him.

--

Edgeworth hates that he has to play these tactics with Phoenix there, looking pale and with one foot in the grave, but he also knows that if he doesn’t prove what they need to prove, then a killer will be allowed free. He has an idea that such an event will only cause Phoenix to do himself more harm than he is already, and Edgeworth has the idea that Franziska and many others won’t forgive him for his part in that.

He has to prove, today, that Phoenix’s client could be the murderer. Even if Phoenix is known for taking on cases that have tight evidence or ‘decisive’ witnesses, he always believes in his clients.

If he’s there, trying to prove his client’s innocence, then he likely believes that Engarde is innocent. Edgeworth wishes he could believe that, or help in some way, but right now, without Phoenix talking to him and being even more afraid of coming near him than the last case together, when they’d shared a kiss and Phoenix had begun to panic more and more…

And now that I know why, I need to show him that I’m willing to have that connection, so he can at least be alive. I know I can’t just say it either - he’s so afraid from what his father and others believe, from the secrecy they have to live in, that just telling him that will likely send him further away.

He knows that Mia is not enjoying his actions either - he’s using many of the same tactics he’d used during the Fawles case, the main difference being that he’s not as arrogant as before, and he’s not simply pulling out the items he’d investigated on his own, without the police’s knowledge. He also actually looked into his witnesses and the ones up for murder - he knows, to a degree, how deeply Engarde and Corrida were fighting, and how proud the two men were in their rivalry. His only problem is finding out more about their personal life - only Corrida’s was open, but he’d become more closed off after Inpax’s suicide.

I can see why Phoenix is not liking this case...too many similarities and bad memories.

He knows that Phoenix might have something to show, and he also notices how both he and Mia tense when the Judge is ready to call a verdict, but Edgeworth wonders if they have any other evidence.

It can only build my case, or work against me. Either way, it might help him out in finding the truth.

Edgeworth had enjoyed the anonymity of being ‘dead’, because it meant he could find out things that he couldn’t have while alive. Like about how the Goffes got their information, the disappearances that Franziska had mentioned, who the ‘Harpy’ was, and, more importantly, how to discover a person’s true intentions. His Fire and Metal chakras were changed by the short time that Phoenix had connected with him, and after he’d finally acknowledge he wanted the connection and those changes, making them more honed to noticing when people were upset or hiding something, and he can all but see how upset and angry Phoenix is with how things are going.

He’s not under threat of losing his badge, and Gavin hasn’t threatened him in a long while - which is not something that I like either - so what’s wrong? What’s got him so worried?

“There is...one piece of evidence that I am curious about,” Phoenix said to answer the Judge’s question about if there’s anything that might worry him or that he wants to present.

“I am ready to call the case in favor of the prosecution, Mr. Wright,” the Judge said simply, making Phoenix look even worse. Edgeworth is beginning to want to just start throwing out random, idiot ideas, if it means Phoenix stops looking so upset and worried. He can almost feel his dread over...over what?

maya...because...me….

Edgeworth stiffens as Phoenix says, “The wine glass.”

“The wine glass?” the Judge asks, confused.

“Look at the photo of the crime scene again. The scene is a mess because of the victim’s struggle against his assailant. Everything that had been on top of the dresser is on the floor...except that wine glass.”

There was silence and it was enough to make Phoenix fidget uncomfortably, looking like his old childhood self, when he was asked about something he wasn’t sure about and had to stand and wait for laughter or someone to tell him he was wrong.

“Well, I do see an issue with this,” the Judge said, looking to Edgworth, “your opinion, Mr. Edgeworth?”

He only has that one piece of evidence, and I have to knock it down…”You don’t need my opinion because there is no special meaning to that glass. It’s safe to say the glass was set there after the crime took place, by the person who discovered the body, Adrian Andrews.”

Phoenix looks upset and so much like his younger self it’s almost painful, shifting before he said, “The defense would like to challenge the prosecution’s theory. Since so much of this trial seems to be riding on proof, maybe there’s something about this glass that makes him so sure it was set by Adrian Andrews?”

It’s so odd that he’s like this, and Edgeworth hates seeing it. Before I decided to end it all, he wouldn’t have fallen for all of these traps. Mia is obviously going soft in her death, and Phoenix’s illness is too far along for all of this to continue.

“The glass didn’t escape my notice, Wright,” he says, knowing it sounds cruel but also knowing that he has to end this trial as quickly as possible, “It was inspected for fingerprints, and only Adrian Andrew’s were found.”

It’s enough to close the case - there’s a motive, a weapon, and evidence. All that remains are various questions that still remain, even in his scenario.

“I thought long and hard about what it means to be a prosecutor, Wright,” he finally tells his friend, noting how he looked, “I think we should show that right now, even if you don’t believe the court is the place for such battles.”

“M-Mr. Edgeworth, you’ve given enough evidence for me to present my verdict!”

maya!

Edgeworth shook his head, but in disagreement and to stop the odd feeling that was resurfacing. Were they still connected, even by a fraction? If so, why was Wright so concerned about May--

She isn’t here. The little girl who’s been around since the first case against Franziska, when Maya Fey was up for murder again...and now Mia is at his side, but not in Maya’s body, in the body of that little girl. Fressia said that such a thing would be a very great strain for someone so young, even if they already obtained a lineage pin or something similar…

...Maya Fey is missing...is that why he’s defending Engarde?

“I can’t allow you to pass judgment yet,” Edgeworth told the Judge, “The prosecution has another witness that we would like the court to hear from.”

“Another witness?” the Judge asked, though Phoenix and Mia looked like they had no idea what he was doing.

I’m doing this to prove everything. I’m not letting something like what happened with Darke and Fawles and countless others happen again.

I’m going to prove, beyond any doubt, that Matt Engarde is guilty.

--

Mia is surprised that her anger at Edgeworth is still as deep as it had been before her death. She knows he’s the one person she can never truly forgive, and whatever changes he’s showing now have, thus far, not impressed her. She doesn’t fully know what his relationship with Phoenix is, but she also knows that he’s started to look pale and ill and had issues with his chakras after Edgeworth’s ‘death’. It’s only getting her angrier that he’s back and acting like his time away was some sort of vacation, that he can come back and simply go back to being the same harsh and cruel prosecutor that he once was.

But something else is worrying her. Phoenix’s chakras, whenever they seem to fade or despair, have some strange answering beacon from Edgeworth. It’s hard to see from where she is, but she can see it and it only seems to make her angrier. Almost angry enough to go to the man in the crowd, who seemed to think he wouldn’t be noticed, and to shake the answers out of Drake Wright about what’s going on with his son.

She has a feeling he knows, and she wants to know. She needs to know, so she can heal him and keep him out of Death.

At least Oldbag being a witness is enough to destroy his calm demeanor, though Phoenix doesn’t look happy about this either. She frowns at him as he says, “She...doesn’t talk to nulls. You or Edgeworth might need to ask my questions for me.”

If it wouldn’t put more of a strain on Pearl’s body, Mia would curse the woman. Right now, the Judge is attempting to interrupt her and she’s saying she’s talking to her “Edgey-poo” as Edgeworth says, “No, please, by all means, interrupt her!” through clenched teeth, looking angry that he has to deal with Oldbag at all.

At least she answers your questions.

He manages to regain his composure enough to direct her to testify about what she’d seen, which seemed to be about Engarde coming out of the victim’s room, as Phoenix looked thoughtful and almost annoyed with something.

“Phoenix?”

“She made a mistake about who she saw before. I’m thinking this is a similar mistake.”

Mia is quiet as the Judge allows him to begin his cross-examination, pausing to say to Oldbag, “I won’t allow what happened last time to occur, witness. You will answer the defense’s questions, or be held in contempt.”

“I agree,” Edgeworth said simply, “I’m not going to play that game again. If you don’t answer the questions, then your testimony will be thrown out as unreliable.”

She let out a huff and glared at Wright before muttering, “Fine, I’ll talk to the void.”

“Another insult and you will be in contempt,” the Judge told her after banging his gavel, causing Oldbag to stiffen before nodding, obviously biting her lip about what she wanted to say. The first push was about why she was there, and though she said that ‘Edgey’ knew, he said, “I have no clue. I despise gossip.”

Phoenix seemed interested in that, but dropped in to instead ask, “You saw my client leave the victim’s room?”

“Yes!”

“....really?”

“You--” she cut off her insult and instead said, “When I say I saw someone, I saw that person!”

“Then tell us what the person was wearing, when you saw them leave the room.”

Oldbag glared and muttered, “What a troublesome little null you are. Something like that doesn’t matter.”

“It does,” Phoenix insisted, taking in a breath, “Indulge me.”

“Fine...it was that thing, the gaudy thing he’s always wearing - that racing jacket.”

Phoenix is quiet a moment before saying, “Could you add that to your testimony?”

“Is it really that relevant?” the Judge asked, curious, and Phoenix nodded, Edgeworth raising a half-hearted objection to it, and seeming to back down as Phoenix proved that, once more, Oldbag had only seen someone dressed as the person the defendant had played on tv. If anything, Edgeworth was even more half-hearted when asked his opinion, as if he couldn’t be bothered with the witness he’d called and especially not when she was such a bad one.

At the same time, Edgeworth seems to know where Phoenix is going and makes little to no real move to stop him from pointing out the contradictions he does find. For one, even if Oldbag knows so much about the case, she’s as unreliable a witness as Phoenix was, when he was put on the stand and had to try to testify against the woman he’d cared for. Mia has a feeling he’d be just as unreliable a witness if he’d seen Edgeworth at the scene of a crime as well.

She wonders if that’s the heart of her anger at Edgeworth, that he reminds her too much of how Dahlia Hawthorne had played Phoenix, and how badly he’d been hurt after the whole thing. Only this time, instead of just ill for a week, he’s slowly fading into nothingness.

Edgeworth’s attempt to explain the new evidence is half-hearted and seems to show his inability to really work on the fly, since he now changes his idea from “premeditated murder” to “opportunistic”. “It’s well enough that the defendant and the victim had bad blood between them,” Edgeworth pointed out about how the two could go from a ‘friendly chat’ to ‘murder’.

“But that theory contradicts an earlier testimony,” Phoenix pointed out, “If, say, it happened the way you said it, then my client wouldn’t have gone with the knife he used at dinner and that was later found in the victim. Not to mention that if he was in costume as the witness says, there should be marks from a glove on this, not his fingerprints all over! That can only mean that someone planted this evidence to misdirect us from the real killer, or to put blame on my client!”

“Objection! Aren’t you forcing the interpretation just a little too hard on this one?” Edgeworth asked, looking a bit rattled but also pleasantly surprised. She was too - that was the most animated she’d seen Phoenix in a long time, though he looked almost exhausted by the end of it, as if arguing that point had taken a lot out of him.

Phoenix straightened at the insult and argued back, “We just established that the witness saw the “Nickel Samurai” in costume, and if that’s true, there shouldn’t be a single fingerprint on that knife!”

Edgeworth glared at the witness, who argued that she couldn’t do anything about her constant mix-ups with the actors and the characters they play on TV. She finally admits she was waiting for someone, but not Corrida. Phoenix, though looking tired, is able to answer that question.

“You were waiting for Adrian Andrews, my client’s manager, to come out of that room.”

Edgeworth fills in when the Judge shows his confusion, about the rumor of their possible affair. Oldbag admits she’d gotten her information and was looking into it for personal reasons, and despite everyone’s near-collective groan, Edgeworth and the Judge allow her to speak about what she’d heard and been looking for.

Phoenix apparently is on top of what she thought, something Mia is glad to see. He’s come so far from being worried and even uncertain of what he can get away with in court, even in the face of the person who had hurt him so badly. At the same time, she’s curious as to what is going on between them.

--

Edgeworth does his best to keep his disgust at the obvious gossip, saying that the actual look into the rag’s article had shown it to be baseless gossip, the sort that had so hurt his image and had brought Phoenix back into his life, but at the price of him seeing Edgeworth through the light of all the rumors about what he’d done.

He’s still upset over it, even knowing the truth, and he’s happy to let Phoenix go after Oldbag on the rumors and how she obtained it.

“How did you obtain this ‘secret information’?”

“Huh? Well...that’s...because I’m a pro!”

“Well, I don’t think it’s that...you probably did get it from another ‘pro’...Ms. Lotta Hart mentioned she’d lost a certain note she’d written to herself. On it, she apparently wrote down her...impressions about the relationship between the victim and Ms. Andrews. They were a bit outrageous, even she admits.”

“Ou-Outrageous ideas! Then...then everything written on this piece of paper is completely meaningless!?”

“Yep, that’s the note that was stolen from Ms. Hart.”

“AH! Wait, no, this is something completely different! It’s my top-secret list of groceries to buy!” When that didn’t work, she finally said, “Look, that puffy-haired nobody was obviously working with Engarde! She even said it - ‘En garde! I’m his sidekick!’”

Silence met her accusation.

“....Edgey-poo! You believe me, right?”

Edgeworth looked disgusted with having been brought into the conversation, though he was obviously relieved when Phoenix brought up that the note had not been destined for the trashcan, but instead was in the camera case with a camera that Lotta had lost. “If you have that note, you have to have that camera!”

Oldbag glared and refused to answer until the Judge banged his gavel, the woman finally saying, “I saw that woman’s business card and I had to ‘borrow’ her camera! I’m a professional security guard! It’s my business to know these things!”

Oldbag was taken away and the prosecution looked into the photos, coming back quickly with the one relevant photograph from the camera, that of the Nickel Samurai had left the room. Even Edgeworth didn’t try to say that it was Engarde in the costume, save that he’d said he was still in costume during the time of the murder.

“But you can’t see his feet. In the posters, you can see his socks and feet. In this, it’s obvious the person is shorter than my client.”

Edgeworth didn’t argue it, getting Phoenix to frown. Mia let her own curiosity at it finally out.

“Edgeworth seems to be letting the trial run itself - he’s unusually calm about it, like he’s only along for the ride.”

Phoenix is quiet a long moment before he muttered, “Maybe this is his new strategy, his new way of being a ‘prosecutor’.”

The Judge pointed out that if the person wasn’t Engarde, then everything the prosecution attempted to prove was rendered meaningless. Edgeworth is silent, thinking, before he looks directly at Phoenix.

Phoenix looks startled at the look as Edgeworth says, “Wright, I think you have proven that the person inside this costume is not Matt Engarde. If that’s the case, who is this a photo of?”

“Adrian Andrews. She’s the only one it could be.”

“Why would you say it’s Ms. Andrews? What in the world points you to her?”

“She’s shorter than Engarde, and as his manager, she can move freely in and out of his room. Also, she had dinner with Engarde that night, which makes it easy for her to get that knife with Engarde’s fingerprints. The knife that the prosecution says was part of the murder…” He pauses, and looks away from Edgeworth, his hands shaking as he finally says, “The defense motions to indict Ms. Adrian Andrews in the murder of Juan Corrida, and for framing the defendant of the crime.”

--

Phoenix does his best to keep himself upright as he says it, to not look at the thing masquerading as Edgeworth and acting like it’s so calm and collected. It’s not Edgeworth, it’s nowhere near Edgeworth, and Phoenix doesn’t need his powers to see that. It’s a gamble, and one that he has to take. He can’t leave things as they are, even knowing that it will extend things an extra day.

Maya...I’m sorry. Maybe he’ll give me some space, let me do this so he’ll get the verdict he wants...but I can’t be sure. I can’t...I failed…

--

“W-wait, your Honor, we have to--”

maya...failed…

“I’m sorry, Mr. Wright, but without--.”

Edgeworth spoke up, “I abhor wasting valuable time.” He saw Phoenix stiffen, not looking directly at him, but the odd bits of emotion Edgeworth felt over the weak, barely-there connection enough to tell him that Phoenix was panicking about something. Who has Maya Fey, and what are they demanding of him? It only seems to be adding to Phoenix’s illness and inability to focus on the trial.

“Your Honor, I request that you please continue with today’s trial.”

“But...we cannot continue due to this unexpected development!”

Edgeworth shook his head. He’d expected this, after he’d told Phoenix about the fact that Andrews was co-dependant on Inpax. He also expected it right after he’d finally seen the photo - whatever else, Andrews was guilty of at least one thing Phoenix claimed she was guilty over, and she might shed light on what really happened.

The problem is that Franziska talked to her first. I have a feeling she told her to not speak about something in court...which means I have to be cruel to get it out of her. This isn’t going to help things at all.

“I’m not surprised that Mr. Wright would want to subpoena Ms. Andrews...I’m just surprised it took him this long.”

Mia glared at him as Wright looked a bit surprised and upset over this, shifting and looking like he’s about to fall over. He’s out of it. Whoever put him up to this should have sent in anyone else.

“Ms. Andrews is waiting in the prosecutor’s lobby. She’s my next witness.”

The Judge is silent a moment before he says, “The court will take a ten minute recess before we hear your next witness.”

He’s grateful for it, as Phoenix probably couldn’t stand for another three minutes of the trial, and he leaves to go prepare his witness and give Phoenix some space.

--

Mia is even unhappier with the recess, though it gives Phoenix time to sit and go over what he has. she’d rather he sit and rest, actually rest, but he looks like doing that will only result in him sleeping for a week.

She hates that Edgeworth is directing so much of this as well. He knows too much, and much of what Phoenix supposes as Andrew’s motivations come from what he told them and the report he gave. Phoenix seems to know that, and is looking worse for wear, enough that his client should comment on it, but instead, he just says, “Just get me a verdict that’s refreshing as a spring breeze, ok Mr. Lawyer dude?”

“That’s what I’m working for,” Phoenix admits, standing as they head back into court and barely managing to hide how he’s waivering. Going up against Edgeworth is taking too much out of him, and Mia almost wishes that she had a way to take over the trial, or someone else to call upon. She hadn’t even seen Salmone in the gallery, which was odd. If she knew about Edgeworth’s return, there’s no doubt in Mia’s mind that the owner of Aral Apartments would tear into the man in a way that no one could stop.

So where was she?

Edgeworth called Adrian Andrews to the stand, who quickly admitted to having a relationship with Juan Corrida and then said, coldly and with a bit of a glare in Phoenix’s direction, “I have a feeling that someone will accuse me of his murder soon.”

Phoenix is quiet on the matter and lets Andrews testify as to what she’d seen, her trying to explain the wine glass as part of her shock. Phoenix questioned her only on the shock, not so much to find out more but to see about the way she answered questions. He looked like he expected her answer to be blunt and almost condescending, but took no notice of the implied insults from either Andrews or Edgeworth. It let him push on the fact that she’d not drank from the glass she’d poured the tomato juice into, and got her to look a bit startled.

She’s calculating, but if you hit her the right way, it starts to crack her armor.

Her attempt to cover and regain control of the situation only lead to another problem - her ‘mistake’ that got the attention of both Phoenix and Edgeworth. Even if Edgeworth was leading the way the trial went, it was obvious he was letting Phoenix do most of the heavy lifting. Mia wanted to smack him, or curse him, do something. She’s still not sure what he’s doing, why he didn’t just run the case or put some other prosecutor here, or even just let Franziska von Karma run it - she seemed happy to do it, even if she was bleeding, and it wouldn’t have beyond her ability anyway.

Still, Edgeworth is obviously upset over her information about the vase, demanding to know why she’d withheld that evidence.

“I’m sorry...I thought that since the crime scene was already in disarray, that people would simply assume that vase was just another part of the mess. I’m sorry...I didn’t touch anything else.”

Edgeworth looks like he doesn’t believe her, his obvious faith in her wavering, as Phoenix suddenly seemed to regain a bit of his fire, going after her for the lies about the guitar case, or at least the fact that she’d not put the facts in order.

“Ms. Andrews said she touched nothing else, so she couldn’t have opened the case AFTER she accidentally knocked over the vase!”

“This matter with the guitar case is a dead end!” Edgeworth argued back, “The guitar was found at the studio! It has no bearing on this case at all!”

“I think it’s a crucial piece of the puzzle,” Phoenix returned, even if he didn’t meet Edgeworth’s eyes, “and considering how it played into her testimony, I’d like for her to testify about it.”

Edgeworth seems to allow that, shrugging it off as she starts. Phoenix interrupts her, pointing out that the guitar case only had the fingerprints of Corrida, not her.

Edgeworth frowns, but Mia is grateful to see him on the defensive, even if Andrews attempts to say she was wearing gloves that night.

“You left fingerprints on the wine glass, though. I doubt you’d wear gloves to open one thing and not to touch another.”

At least Phoenix was showing himself to be fine, or that the weight of what he was being forced to do wasn’t holding him back from being his old self.

“So you intend to prove that the guitar case wasn’t empty?”

“Yes,” Phoenix said with a confidence he hadn’t shown before. “I intend to prove it too.” He pulled out the photo of the Nickel Samurai, “I say the costume of the Nickel Samurai was in that case.”

“WHAT?” Edgeworth looked upset over that explanation as Phoenix continued. “She would have to put it on in order to make her escape. She couldn’t let anyone see her leaving, right Ms. Andrews?” At her silence, Phoenix continued, “Not to mention that a rather enthusiastic investigative journalist took a picture which proves whoever was in the costume last was much shorter than my client. It wouldn’t be that hard to get a spare costume as well, since my client wore his before and after the ceremony.”

But even as he got going, she noticed something very striking. Even without looking directly at Edgeworth, Phoenix and Edgeworth seemed to suddenly get into sync when talking about the reason for that costume to be in Juan Corrida’s room, as well as the reason for the conference that Engarde didn’t know anything about.

Andrews finally let out a ‘hmph’, still turning the odd card she had around in her hand as she said, “I can see why you are pros at what you do. Yes, the press conference was set up by Juan. I was the one he asked to help set it up, and the person who prepared the second costume for him.” She pulled out her notebook, looking through it casually. “Juan had bet everything on the Jammin’ Ninja this year. If he lost the Grand Prix, he was going to make sure that Matt was going down with him. Somehow, Juan had gotten his hands on a secret so powerful that it would destroy Matt’s acting career had it been revealed.”

Though pressed, she didn’t reveal what the secret was, saying that only Juan knew and that she’d only come off as suspicious to ‘protect’ Matt.

Even Phoenix didn’t come off as this suspicious to protect that evil woman. Mia thought as Andrew’s true mask came off, her attempt to talk her way out of the mess showing as she gave her testimony. She was nervous, afraid, and her chakras were all but bouncing with light as they she attempted to keep herself calm and figure out a way out of the situation she was in.

Phoenix picks up on the one weak argument, pointing out that the knife wasn’t conclusive evidence, and the button wasn’t either, since the death was by strangulation - the button came off when someone planted the knife. Almost unconsciously, he and Edgeworth once more began their back-and-forths as Phoenix pointed out how the button wasn’t decisive evidence of Engarde’s guilt. Because there was blood on it, it had to have been taken off after Corrida was stabbed, meaning after he died.

“Which means it’s impossible that this button was torn off during the victim’s final struggle because the victim was strangled to death in that fight.”

Edgeworth raised his objection to the whole thing, playing the one asking the ‘stupid questions’, Mia supposed, as Phoenix answered with his own questions. “Why was the button torn off? What purpose did that serve? We know the button wasn’t torn off during the fight, so that means the murderer took the time and effort to purposefully rip this from the victim’s body, meaning they had something in mind.”

Edgeworth is silent, letting Phoenix continue with his point - the button could only be evidence that someone wished to frame Engarde, not evidence of the murder itself. But with her testimony and with all of the evidence anyway, it already pointed to her being the killer.

--

Phoenix ran with everything they had, pushing back any attempt to contradict what there was before him. It wasn’t until Adrian Andrews said “Please...stop…” that he suddenly realize how much he’d let go of himself, how his powers were now starting to bubble up, through all of his shields and the drugs he’d been taking.

And he could feel her fear and attempt to latch onto whatever she could, a familiar voice speaking to her in words he couldn’t make out and, realizing what was going on, he refused to listen to, pulling his power as far back into himself as he could and thinking of glaciers and ice.

I can’t let her get to me. I can’t. Maya’s life is on the line! I have to do this!

“I...I refuse...to testify,” Andrews finally said when prompted to speak by the Judge, Phoenix using his hands on the bench to hold himself up as Andrews continued, “There’s...a law, that says I can’t be forced to testify about something...if it can incriminate me.”

So von Karma told her that, then...I wonder why…

“Why should you care? You’re here to get a verdict, not care about the one you put in jail for the crime.”

He managed to not wince at the spike of ice, or at the voice in his mind, and instead focused on the trial as Edgeworth finally said, “Run out of evidence, Wright?”

He glared at the thing masquerading as his friend, sometimes acting like he was Edgeworth and sometimes acting like the demon it was. He wasn’t pulling any punches, instead making Phoenix work and pull and feel his shields to his powers dropping more and more.

“Everything you’ve proven up to this point is meaningless, circumstantial.”

His temper, normally kept in check, flares with his powers. “Like all the evidence you provided as well?” he straightened, but had yet to glare the fake-Edgeworth in the eyes, “None of the evidence is definitive proof for either of our cases. Even if my client had a rivalry with Juan Corrida, Ms. Andrews also had reason to kill him, if we’re going for something that petty.”

I would hate for people to know about my weakness...for someone like myself, to have such a thing might mean the end of my career…

“Do you know something that we don’t, Mr. Wright?” the Judge asked.

To not get a complete acquittal today means I am responsible for killing Maya...but even knowing what I know, can I really say that Ms. Andrews killed Corrida? Can I even think it?

“If you don’t do it, I will certainly find a creative way to leave her body for you to find, Mr. Lawyer,” the voice of the killer makes him draw in his breath, “So...either you say it, or I’ll make you say it.”

“I...please, the trial has to continue...because…”

MAYA…

--

maya…

...make you say it…

my...fault...again…

Edgeworth raised the objection before the final bit even reached him, the sudden wave of despair and pain he felt from Phoenix suddenly making him realize what it was that he’d gone through, that last day.

If this is even a fraction of what he felt from me...what have I done?

“It’s true Ms. Andrews has the right to not testify if the conversation will self-incriminate...it doesn’t hold for something that is not incriminating, and I do have something I’m curious about. Ms. Andrews, when you found the body, you said you poured yourself a glass of juice. Most people are far too shaken to do anything of the sort, so that behavior is...unusual.”

“So because my behavior is unusual-.”

“Before you continue, I want to state that if you have a reason behind your actions,” Edgeworth interrupted, “I would like you to testify to that effect.”
“T-testify!?”

“So, I would request you testify again about what happened when you first discovered the body.” He said to her, “Whatever we find out in this testimony should, in no way, implicate the witness.”

Both Phoenix and Mia are giving him odd looks, though Mia’s actually meets his eyes and he can see the distrust and anger in them. Andrews testifies, but incriminates herself anyway, all but winning the case for Phoenix.

He doesn’t look happy at all, as if Andrew’s inability to claim the guilt of what happened seems to eat at him. Edgeworth wants the truth as well - he knows how to get it, and while such a method would hurt Andrews at the moment, he’d rather hurt her now and get the truth then have her incriminated by her refusal to testify and her sudden latching-on to Franziska’s ideas.

He raised the objection as he sees Phoenix looking even more afraid and almost depressed, and he wonders about what he’d said at the precinct. He believes in his clients...he believes Engarde is innocent...and if someone found a way to exploit that?

“I don’t know who planted the idea in your head, but so long as you keep your ‘silence’, Engarde will go free and YOU will be the guilty party.”

“T-that...that’s a lie! I don’t believe you! I...I was told...if I spoke...if I spoke, then it would be all over, and...and Matt would never be declared guilty.”

sh...scared...von karma...why?

He doesn’t even let himself look at Wright, hoping that he hasn’t noticed the small link they still have, even though Edgeworth wants to exploit it, if only to give Phoenix more life and ability to think. Between whatever is going on with Maya and what Edgeworth has put him through, Phoenix is ready to collapse. He seems like he’s trying hard to not feel or see what’s going on, but he can’t help but notice her plight or what she’s feeling.

He’s been trying to push this down, to survive what I did to him, to survive however he could, and now it’s ricocheting back towards him, hitting him as hard as Ms. Andrew’s fears and co-dependency is hitting her.

“Wright,” Edgeworth finally says, and when their eyes lock, he’s both grateful as well as upset with himself all over again. “You have to think this through carefully...think about what this witness has done and what she hasn’t done, and think about who is the real mastermind behind this crime!”

What type of a person has a year of pain made you?

“...I...I want Ms. Andrews to testify.”

It sounds like every word is pulled from his painfully, and he says to her simply, looking like he’s holding himself up by sheer willpower alone, “I won’t accept an acquittal like this. You can’t mean to take his place in jail instead of testifying to one thing.”

“Sh-shut up!”
Phoenix suddenly straightens, and looks furious. Through even the small connection that Edgeworth has with him, he feels only a sudden firestorm. “I have proof of why you would want to kill Juan Corrida and then you cry over it not being your fault, of why you’d pin it on someone else. Since the prosecution gave it to me, I can legally tell the court exactly how pitiful you are. You’re a high-normal, but you have an illness that’s only expected from something as lowly as a null like me.”

“S-stop.”

“And it’s because of that that you’d be willing to kill Corrida, or if you didn’t, it’s why you’re up there, crying like we’re supposed to treat you differently because you decided to plead the fifth due to someone telling you to. That because you don’t want to talk about what happened to you, we don’t have to. Your status and power-level doesn’t afford you special treatment under the law. It might do so everyone where else, but not here, and don’t think that if I don’t tell that the prosecutor won’t be cold-hearted enough to not pull it out from you either.”

“I...no! If you tell, I...I’ll…”

“If you even dare say ‘choose death’, I will take this time to rescind my request that would give you time to at least think for yourself instead of going with whatever someone else says for once! If I don’t get it from you, someone else who knows the truth will say it, and either way, everyone will know.”

Andrews is shaking at Phoenix’s rage, and Edgeworth doesn’t blame her. He’s never really seen Phoenix this mad, not even when he’d returned and shown himself at the precinct, and some part of him wonders about what finally broke through his self-contained barrier. Phoenix had never liked showing any emotions beyond somewhat comical ones, and his anger or grief were almost always private, or for his closest friends to see. Edgeworth seeing them had been because of how close they’d once been, of how much closer Edgeworth wanted to be and had almost pushed on him, as well as Phoenix’s unconscious push towards Edgeworth as well.

“He’s right,” Edgeworth finally says, seeing Andrew’s resolve break, “I will let you choose death, if it means I pull out the truth from you before that.”

Andrews is quiet before she says quietly, “I...I’ll talk...but...help...I...nothing matters anymore.”

Phoenix seems to visibly relax, though Mia is looking at him with something that resembles a curious look, but also one that seems to show her recalling something that only she and Phoenix were privy to. Phoenix slumps a bit before he says, almost too quietly to hear. “I apologize, Ms. Andrews. Please...tell us what really happened.”

He sounds pained again, and Andrews nods before she speaks, telling the real story this time. She’s upset at Engarde, calling him scum for what he did. “He’s trying to escape his guilt again...just like last time!”

Despite that, the cross-examination goes quickly and smoothly to a degree. She’s telling the truth, and so there are no contradictions. At the same time, Edgeworth wondered if stabbing Juan, even when he was dead, wasn’t an act of revenge as well...after all, it had been Juan who had cut off his engagement to Inpax for no discernable reason, and who had possibly held her suicide note and, thus, the information about Matt Engarde he was going to share with everyone, but not with Inpax’s protege and the woman who’d cared so much for her.

Wright doesn’t even bother trying to raise an objection, looking defeated and already putting his head in his hands.

It’s then that Edgeworth notices something in Andrew’s hands, as he starts to move to take her to the detention center. “Witness...would you mind if I asked you something?”

“Hmm?”

“Before we leave, I wondered if I might look at one thing,” he pointed to the card in her hand, “It’s had my interest for quite some time now. What exactly is it?”

“Oh...Mr. Wright asked about it as well…” she showed the white card with the red seashell on it, “Although I didn’t remember at the time, I remember now that I found it in the room on that day...I found the card when I discovered Juan’s body. It was lying right next to him…”

He knew that card, from one of the cases he’d helped Fressia and her husband work. Suddenly, what was happening, why Phoenix looked defeated, what happened with Maya, clicked into place.

“WITNESS!” he shouted, startling them both, “Give me that card! Hurry!”

“H-huh?” “E-Edgeworth?”

“Do you have any idea what you have stupidly, yet inadvertently done!?” People given that card can be marked, or hurt from afar, or even…it’s the call sign of Shelly de Killer and it means that this is far more dangerous than I imagined! “I can’t believe you hid this from me all this time!”

Andrews apologizes as he takes it from her, escorting her out as his fear for Wright and his unease at this case grows.

Corrida was killed by de Killer...Wright believes that Engarde is innocent of the killing, and he must have a way of telling that…

Wright is defending someone who hired a known killer, and who is holding Maya captive. I must do all I can to protect him.

Chapter Text

Hotti Clinic

3:00pm

Waking up from surgery and painkillers is not something Franziska wanted to do, and she barely remembers who she’s angry at when a soft hand rubs her own in a familiar way, the same way it had when she’d been ill once, a long time ago.

“You’re awake,” Fressia says with a deep sigh, “that’s good. They’re almost out of the courthouse - Miles should be here soon.”

“Good,” she muttered, “then I can whip him to show my displeasure at his foolishness.” She barely managed a glare at her sister - whichever Pharamakon they were using knew his thing, and she was still feeling the effects of the painkillers and drugs to make her go under. “I should do the same to you...what were you thinking, keeping him away for so long?”

“I was thinking he needed to discover himself,” Fressia said, “and that he needed to know that the path he was on was the right one. He was very confused and hurt when he came to us, Fran. Despite all of that, he wanted to be strong so that, no matter what he came back to, he could hold Phoenix up and get him through what was going on. We learned, almost too late, about what might happen if we didn’t try to hurry, but you know that learning, especially about yourself, cannot be forced.” She let out a sigh and looked back at Franziska. “We knew it was a risk, sister. We didn’t want to take it, but we had no choice.”

“Then why are you here now?”

“There’s something about this case that doesn’t sit well for any of us. The way things are going, what happened to end Corrida’s life...and Engarde himself, all of it isn’t good.”

“Not to mention whoever shot me,” Franziska muttered managing to sit up. Even if it was with her sister’s help, there was no shame in that.

Fressia is silent a long moment before she said, “I don’t like that either. Not because I hate seeing you hurt, but because…” she shifted before saying quietly, “de Killer is the one who did it.”

Franziska tenses a bit and winces as the pain in her shoulder flares. She knew that name, and she’s not surprised that her sister knows it, but the only ones who really know exactly how dangerous he is would be Interpol, and Franziska knows that because she’s been considering working for them exclusively, instead of being a prosecutor in just one country. It will be a challenge, and one that neither Edgeworth nor her father took up, meaning it would be her field and hers alone.

“Alan worked a case a little while ago, dealing with a...similar situation. He was not attacked, but we think it was a close thing.” Fressia lets out a breath and looks at her with fear showing in her eyes. “I was worried about you, Fran. When you got hit…” She moved and pulled her into an awkward hug, obviously not trying to jar her shoulder too much. “Don’t scare me like that again.”

Franziska finally leaned her head against her sister’s shoulder, grateful for the touch and to see her again. “Does Mama know?”

“She’s on her way down from Sacramento. She only heard about you getting shot. I’m sure she’ll figure out some way to pin this on Wright.”

“...I won’t let her. It’s Engarde’s fault, not his.”

Fressia let out a small huff of air as she pulled away a bit. “You know how she is.” Checking the time, she said, “I’m going to call Edgeworth, see how the trial has been going. It should be done by now…”

Franziska let out a sigh as Fressia left, resting and considering what to do. She wishes that Miles Edgeworth had not been so foolish as to stay away so long, that he’d at least had some sense to return before all of this happened. Now, she would probably have to clean things up and make sure Mother and Wright didn’t come near each other, since she’d all but promised Maya Fey that she’d protect him from her mother. That sentiment remained despite all that had happened - she was going to protect Wright because Miles Edgeworth was a foolish fool of a fool who foolishly believed he could simply come back and show his new way of ‘prosecuting’ and all would be well. Franziska knew this wouldn’t be the case, no matter what happened. She wanted to defeat Phoenix Wright to show it could be done...but if he was as ill as she thought, then she would rather Miles Edgeworth and he stop being so foolish and admit to being fools for each other, so when Wright was back to his peak self, she could face him again.

A sudden pinch on her leg gets her to react instinctively, using her left hand to whip the person there, the man who called himself “Director Hotti” when he was just a patient who appeared to enjoy harassing the female patients and staff. “OW!”

“Go to your room!” she ordered, not in the mood to deal with him as Fressia came back, glaring at him as he slunk out before saying, “Miles is on his way here. He had a few things to deal with first.”

Franziska let out a sigh. “Like?”

“Like the ‘deal’ you made with one of the witnesses?” Franziska is silent at the accusation. “I know you’re upset with us, Fran, but to make such a deal…”

“I had to win,” she said, “even if Wright only goes with innocent clients, all I’ve learned about this one says that he isn’t, that he’s guilty as sin.”

Fressia frowns. “If he’s so guilty, then why is…” she stops, as if putting something together. “Franziska...don’t antagonize Wright.”

“Why n--?” de Killer is the one who shot me...oh… “If he needs help, he should have said something.”

Fressia shook her head. “I don’t think he can. That’s the problem, Fran - that family is known for taking doing all they can for the service of their clients. That includes getting a lawyer for them and putting pressure on them as needed. I know you want to win, but you shouldn’t do so by burning your bridges and using people.”

She glared at Fressia, upset over being told this when she felt bad enough for using Adrian Andrews in her hopes of putting Engarde behind bars. The woman’s work to throw him into jail was not something Franziska needed to worry about, not at the moment, and she’s not about to stay and be lectured by Fressia over how she should and shouldn’t run her trials. Adrian Andrews had given her the items that should have put Matt Engarde away, and she doubts that Miles Edgeworth had managed to get the verdict they needed.

He went soft because of Wright, because Phoenix Wright was the defense. He thinks that just because Wright is defending him, he must be innocent of the deed. He’s not. I don’t know how he did it, but he’s not innocent.

“I’m not apologizing for using such a weak-willed woman. She should have gotten the help she needs. It’s foolish to let something like that go unchecked, as you saw with Miles Edgeworth.”

“I did, but not everyone comes to me or any other Shaman of my ability with such issues. Being co-dependant on someone, when you have such a high level, is not always considered a good thing. I know you are starting to see how things work here, Fran, and that it’s upsetting you, but understand that even with the horrible prejudices that come to go after nulls like Wright, the social stigma of admitting you can do something, that you’re ill or something similar, has kept many of our peers from seeking the help they need, and even cost a few lives.”

She glares at Fressia as her sister adds, “No, I’m not saying it’s the same. It’s simply something that you must take into consideration. We’re put under pressure as well, even if it’s not as much as nulls. I’m sure Maya Fey and her cousin will have to deal with issues later, as far as who they decide to sleep with and what type of children come out of that.”

Franziska knew that - their mother had not been welcomed back by some of her friends because she’d ‘married down’, even though Papa was a high-level Wicca who’s whole family were all high-level. The von Karmas far exceeded even a few of them as far as wealth and power were concerned as well, but that didn’t matter to them. What mattered was Lisbeth D’Arcy had married someone of a lower grade, even if that grade was only a step down and about to move up. It was like complaining the chef didn’t have a Michelin star when you’d just been delivered ambrosia.

A short knock and clearing of throat got both she and Fressia to look over, Franziska frowning at the man she saw in her doorway, holding a small bunch of tulips and wildflowers. His hair was prematurely grey and pushed back, a bit wild but with spikes coming out from behind, and a few strands falling over his pale face. He wore a dark sweater that was a bit like canvas or denim, a worker’s outfit, with faded blue jeans and steel-toed boots that were scruffed and obviously well-used and abused, if some of the tears in them said anything. He looked a bit apologetic for interrupting their conversation, and shifted from foot to foot, looking nervous.

She frowned at him, watching the way he held himself and how he acted. Where had she seen that way of acting before?

“I, ah…” he slowly extended the flowers to her. “I heard you were hurt, Ms. von Karma. I...ah...well…” he reached back to scratch his head, as if thinking, and sudden realization came to her.

This was Drake Wright, the one that she’d only read about, who had abused his son and who was a drunkard and a liar...and who right now was sober as the Judge, and looking so like his son that it was almost painful to see.

Fressia’s glare was the only thing that stopped her from whipping the man senseless, and she instead barked out, “What do you want?”

Drake looked a bit taken aback by her antagonistic attitude, and shifted again before saying, “I was at the court today. I heard you were hurt, and…” he let out a breath and looked away. “And...you’ve been a good friend to my son.”

Fressia looked surprised. Franziska didn’t blame her. “W-what?”

“My...my son hasn’t been...well, after the…” he doesn’t finish, and he puts the flowers down before he can damage them, “my son’s been ill. And while I know you don’t realize it, Ms. von Karma, I know he was looking forward to seeing you in court, not the br--not Edgeworth.” He shifts again, and she wonders how much of Phoenix is in Drake, and how often he looked like this, apologetic and sober, during his time growing up.

Fressia looks at him curiously before she says simply, “Miles knows how ill Phoenix is. That’s why he came back.”

Drake glares at her, the same anger that Phoenix Wright had shown when Franziska had said Miles Edgeworth was alive, shining in his gray eyes as he says in clipped tones, “If he knows, then he shouldn’t have come back at all.”

“Mr. Wright, please--.”

“As if that brat knows anything about my son!” Drake finally says, and Franziska can’t help but admire that he’s standing up to them, two high-level sisters who could easily go after him if they wanted, “It’s his fault anyway, and now he wants to come back and...what, take credit for all the pain he’s caused Nick? At least I acknowledge that my stupidity made Nick’s life hell before I found a lot of good reasons to sober up, but that brat has no excuses. He did that to Nick, and it’ll be a cold day in Hell before I forgive him!”

“Mr. Wright--” Fressia tried again, but Franziska said simply, her voice seeming to cut through anything Drake Wright or Fressia wanted to say, “I know why you hate high-levels, Mr. Wright. I know that you dislike my brother and have for some time. And I had every wish to go and conduct the trial, bullet or no.” He’s quiet, looking at her, as Fressia gives her a worried look as well. “I came here because my sister and brother dragged me here...and despite my wanting to go forward with the trial, I understand why they did it, and I also admit that some part of me is grateful they did. I don’t know what would have happened, if I had decided to enter that courtroom today.” She looks him over, noticing how sad and worried and angry he is, and she wonders if that is how Phoenix looks when he isn’t ill, when he’s not addicted to drugs that are the only thing keeping him upright and mobile but also causing his blood pressure to plummet so low he faints after a trial. “I don’t expect you to forgive him, but my brother was doing what he thought was right, as foolish as it was. That he didn’t hurry, or that he couldn’t, is not his fault. But I won’t try to convince you of that, as my sister wants to do. He was a foolish fool to ever leave, and even more of a fool to think he could come back and fix the mess when it is so obviously beyond just his ability to fix.” If anything, Drake Wright relaxes at that.

“However...realize that the only way I have ever heard of you is as a foolish, drunken, abusing bastard of a father who is the cause of all the ills Phoenix Wright suffered before my foolish brother foolishly left in the foolish way he did. My own father was not perfect, despite his claims, and I would like to believe he never actually hit Miles Edgeworth, though now I know I cannot be certain. He only cared for Miles Edgeworth for a short time, and despite those years, Miles Edgeworth can always remember a time when he was loved, and cared for, and not under my father’s thumb. Phoenix Wright does not have that same luxury, and that is your fault.” Feeling vindicated, she finally says, “If I see you again while I’m well, expect me to whip you at least three times, if not more if I ever see you anything less than sober.”

He looks at her, really looks at her, their eyes meeting, and he quirks a smile so like the ones she’s seen in the old recordings of when Wright was dealing in cases against Edgeworth, that she’s almost taken aback. Was nothing of Wright’s mother in Phoenix, and what did that say about her, that all of those odd things came from a man like Drake Wright?

“I suppose that’ll be another reason for me to stay sober, though it’s been a trial and will probably be even more so...after…” he pauses, and she frowns. His look when from amused and accepting to so suddenly upset and sad that she realizes what it is he’s expecting.

“I will not let Phoenix Wright die until I’ve defeated him,” she tells him seriously, “even if I have to go into Death itself to drag him back.”

He’s quiet a long moment before he tells her seriously, “Trust me when I say there won’t be anything left of him for Death to claim. He has an illness my dad had...and it was one of the many reasons I started drinking the way I did. Seeing Nick like this…” he lets out a breath, sounding very defeated, “you’re probably going to use that whip on me far more than you’d like, if things go the way they’ve been going.” He gave her a small, sad smile. “I do hope you get better, Ms. von Karma, no matter what my thoughts on high-levels may be...you’ve cured me of the prejudice a bit.”

She blinks at that, amazed at the admission, as Drake Wright leaves the room. Fressia looks annoyed but Franziska isn’t. If that is Drake Wright when sober, and he is able to show such emotion and self-knowledge, she wishes whoever and whatever caused him to take up drink to burn in the lowest level of Hell there is, and face torture that was only acknowledge in old, ancient fables about what happened when you tried to disrupt the natural order or angered the Gods to the point that they took notice.

Franziska hopes what he believes about Phoenix Wright’s illness is wrong, but she also has an idea that he may know exactly what he’s talking about, and his defeat at what could happen to Wright, that after all of this Wright will no longer be alive, is enough to make her stand, even as Fressia looks at her worriedly.

“I’m fine,” Franziska said, suddenly upset over her sister’s attitude. “I simply wish to walk, and see how strong I am. I will have to get used to this.”

“Fran…”

“I’m going to work for Interpol. They’re going to have de Killer trials as well. He’ll try this again and again. I will be the one he doesn’t kill, if it comes down to that.”

Fressia looks very upset at this, shifting forward, then finally seems to realize what Franziska’s determined look means. “I will speak to Alan about it. He knows some good spells that you might need. And...when you are on good terms with Miles again, speak to him.”

“He and I learned the same spells after that woman attacked us, and after the Fawles trial,” she told her sister as she straightened, happy to note the pain in her shoulder didn’t flare up when she did, “I know those. But I am always happy to learn others.”

Wright & Co Law Offices

3:45pm

Pearl was crying, the exhaustion from having held onto Mia for so long, as well as all that was going on with the trial, finally spilling over as she weeped for Maya. Gumshoe had arrived about five minutes after they got back, his box of things set on the other desk that Phoenix had once used, the big man doing his best to calm Pearls down. Phoenix was fine with giving him all the information he had now, noting the lack of pain and wondering if that meant what he thought. Though de Killer had been speaking to him through most of the trial, and had tried to force him to end the trial once, the pain spike was lessening and he wondered if that meant he was only listening for certain times.

He couldn’t examine the thing anyway, his powers too caught up in boiling around and trying to latch onto the others, to take away their pain. He was too hyper-aware of it, even as his own body suffered and Gumshoe tried to talk Pearls into a nap or something. She was exhausted, and protested every step until she finally fell asleep on the sofa, covered in Gumshoe’s massive coat.

“This is bad, pal,” he said simply, “I mean...I never knew you two to act like that.”

“I’ve never been under the stress of doubting my client,” Phoenix said simply as he sat. “Even with Edgeworth and Lana, I knew they were innocent. I didn’t like Lana, but I knew she was being played, and I didn’t like how it was going. But right now…” he took out the magatama, turning it over in his hands and feeling the warmth from the power that Pearls had put into it. “I don’t know about Engarde. He’s telling the truth about not killing anyone, but...why did he say it like that? He worded his answer carefully, and something...I don’t know.”

Engarde had been like a black hole, sucking in everything. At least Gavin had instances of emotion, even if Phoenix didn’t know what they were. Engarde is black, nothing at all, and no matter what he says about being “refreshing as a spring breeze”, he’s nothing of the sort to Phoenix.

“Maybe you can ask the guy for an extension?” Gumshoe asked, looking worried.

“I can’t take too long,” Phoenix said, his fears starting to peak as his emotions and powers rolled and fought within him. Like this, he was dangerous to people, and he wanted to just find a good place to hide, or die. But he couldn’t do that just yet, not until Maya was safe and everything was taken care of. As much as it felt like what Edgeworth had done, Phoenix had to remember that the alternative to disappearing was to one day simply not wake up, and have them go through that round of worries. He doubts his friends will send him to a hospice, or somewhere that won’t test him or ask questions, and he fears the result of any attempt to revive him after his powers finally waste away and he gives up. With only one pill left, he doubts it will be enough to hold back everything or anything, and his hands shake slightly at the prospect of getting more of the drug when all of their time needed to be focused on finding out the truth. He had to know if Engarde was really guilty, had to know what that card symbolized and why it scared Edgeworth so much...and he wanted to make sure Franziska von Karma was alright.

“Pal?” Gumshoe sounded upset and worried, Phoenix coming back and realizing he’d been too focused internally, that his mind had all but left reality. It’s already happening.

“I’m...sorry, I was just...it’s a lot. We have a lot of work to do.” He glanced at where Pearls slept. “Could you watch over her while I go and...I need to check on von Karma. I want to make sure she’s alright.”

He’s worried about that decision, though, and he manages to stand as Gumshoe gives him a worried look. He doesn’t want to go anywhere near a clinic, not when his power is so out-of-control. At the same time, he feels responsible for what happened to Franziska, and wants to make sure she’s alright and not in pain or something.

“If the little miss wakes up while you’re gone, she’s gonna be upset,” Gumshoe settles on, even though he’s obviously trying to figure out a way to go with Phoenix that isn’t too obvious. The fact he can feel the emotions again, raw and dancing over his skin like sunburns, makes him do his best to drown out his powers. With the spike in place, though, keeping at least some of it pinned, he can’t really do it, though.

“I know,” he admits, “but she needs to rest before we can go back to looking for clues. Holding Mia for that long was obviously taxing, and I’d rather she be rested and ready for the day then about to fall over.” He gave a wry smile. “I’m kinda taking up all of that, I guess.”

“Alright, pal, I’ll watch over her, but you’d better be careful, ok? After all, you got me to help you out with the rest of this, and I didn’t even tell Edgeworth about that Maya thing.”

The reminder of Maya’s predicament made Phoenix droop a bit, and though Gumshoe tried to speak up and change what he said, or at least apologize, the defense attorney shook his head.

“It’s fine. We can’t tell Edgeworth anyway,” the ice spike had twisted at the name, at least by Phoenix muttering it, and he did his best to not wince at the pain as he added, “I still need to go see if she’s alright. I’ll head over to the Gatewater afterwards, and to talk to my…” he paused and looked at Gumshoe, “well, OUR client...about all that happened. I’m kinda curious.”

Gumshoe frowned. “What about?”

“Celeste Inpax. If she hadn’t died, Corrida wouldn’t have gotten what he did on Engarde, and he wouldn’t have gotten the help he had from Andrews. My problem is figuring out more of the connection...what happened to her to cause that suicide? Andrews knows a lot, but I don’t know how much she’ll tell me, after what happened today.” He looks away, ashamed of how he’d acted, of letting his anger and the emotions from before cause him to go after her when she had been on the stand and her own emotions and fears had been raw.

Phoenix headed to Hotti Clinic, taking the last pill and grateful when it didn’t cause the same roller-coaster of emotions and pain that the three before had, before getting a small bunch of tulips and wildflowers then heading into the clinic. He’s not surprised to see Edgeworth talking to “Director Hotti” about von Karma’s health, both men relaxing when they hear that the surgery went well and that she’s fine, though his mention of how she ‘yelped’ when he pinched her, the sudden whip sends him skittering back to his room, though he mutters about if he wants to get used to the whipping and if it’ll be worth it.

She glares at him more than Edgeworth, looking at the tulips with a strange change in her eye, as if she went from angry to suddenly surprised by something before she asks, “So...who are those tulips for?”

He blushes badly, afraid, and finally offers them over to her carefully, hoping that the drug hasn’t left him to open to the pain that might come from her own pain. He can feel just a bit of it, as painful as the spike already in his mind, and he’s grateful when she takes them and no extra pain comes up. Edgeworth is watching but also stays far away as the Shaman that raised him comes up, looking a bit worried and also a bit confused as she sees the bouquet in von Karma’s hand as Edgeworth turns to speak to her, von Karma obviously annoyed with his ‘interference’ and not apologetic over what she’d talked Andrews into that had won him another day, but had nearly sent her to jail.

She walked off after only a few questions, her feelings shaken and also so mixed he couldn’t focus on them, and he flinches a bit when Edgeworth walks over to look at him, Phoenix suddenly wishing he’d asked Gumshoe or someone else to come with him to see von Karma. He’s grateful that at least she’s looking like she is getting over the trauma of getting attacked and that the shot was not too bad that she couldn’t be up and somewhat better by tomorrow, even if it would still be the thing acting like Edgeworth at the trial tomorrow.

“Wright,” Edgeworth said, looking at him with worry as Phoenix got ready to leave, “I need to ask you a question.”

“No, you don’t. I have things to do.”

“Where’s Maya Fey?” Phoenix pauses, the spike in his mind starting to pulse as Edgeworth said, “She’s almost always by your side, unless she’s under suspicion of murder, or at Kurain. Though...if that was the case, I don’t know why she’d leave that young girl here.”

Phoenix took in a breath, trying to calm himself down as he feels the spike start to dig into him as he said, “I don’t have to tell you anything.”

“That card,” Edgeworth continued, obviously trying to get something to get him to stay, “that was the calling card of a man called Shelly de Killer. He’s only mentioned when he leaves that after killing someone on a contract. No one knows what he looks like, how he does it, only that if that card is left, he has killed the person, and that he will do all he can to ensure his client is not found out.”

Phoenix barely moves as Edgeworth adds, “de Killer is the name of the family. They’ve been mentioned for at least one hundred years, though it’s very likely they’ve been around for far longer. This one is only the third official heir we know of, and that card is part of his duty to his clients, to show he’d done the job.”

“Why tell me this,” Phoenix slowly asks, “unless you intend to bring in this ‘de Killer’ as the real criminal?”

Edgeworth gave him a long look. “Considering that no one knows what he looks like, or even what he is capable of, do you really think I could do that? The only thing I could possibly do is arrest the one who hired him, as all the others have done.”

Phoenix let out a breath as he said, “If it was de Killer, there’s no reason to prosecute my client, then. He didn’t kill Corrida.”

Edgeworth shook his head. “He’s on trial now for facilitating the murder - for hiring de Killer.”

The spike flared and Phoenix drew in a breath, hopefully looking more surprised then pained. Some of it must have come out, because for a second, Phoenix saw Edgeworth reaching for him, his hand almost brushing Phoenix’s coat, when another suddenly grabbed his and a slap sounded throughout the small clinic waiting area. Phoenix blinked and stepped back as Salmone Hari gripped Edgeworth’s arm, her hand still in the final movement it’d made to hit him soundly across the face, as she began to curse in Russian at him.

“I assure you, either Franziska or Fressia would find that rather rude,” Edgeworth muttered as he looked back at Salmone, apparently not upset at seeing the murderous woman. “You look well, for someone who had to deal with a D’Arcy, even if it was through legal matters only. How was Lisbeth, last you saw her?”

That only brought out a new string of curses as Phoenix attempted to walk away, hoping that he could at least look into everything that was going on, before Edgeworth said, during a break in Hari’s verbal attacks, “Wright, tell me where Maya Fey is. Tell me why it was so important you got the trial over with today and not simply at your own pace.”

Phoenix froze, the ice spike seemed to twist in him like the bullet in Franziska von Karma’s shoulder, and he took in a breath before saying, “I don’t have to tell you anything, Edgeworth. It’s none of your business. You’re...you…” he can’t bring himself to say it, not to this thing that sounds so much like his friend, and already the pressure and everything is pushing at his mind again. “You have no right to come in and think that you can just...if…” he can’t, he can’t say it, no matter how much it hurts him to keep it in, how much the fire and everything burns with a need that he can’t even figure out.

“Wright,” Edgeworth pushed past the protested Salmone to say, “What happened a year ago was not your fault. The only one to blame for all of that was me - I was unable to handle what was going on, I didn’t seek help or someone to speak to when I should have, and I was unwilling to compromise when I should have. I am back now, I know myself better...and if I’d know the pain it would have caused you, I never would have left the way I did.”

It’s a pretty speech, and he wonders how long it took the Shaman and demon inside his friend to come up with it. He can’t look at him, and instead he says, “I work to do. If you and von Karma are going to sit around congratulating yourselves on ruining lives so easily, you don’t need me here to do it.”

Edgeworth doesn’t reach out for him, but instead pulls out a bit of paper. “Then take this. It will gain you access to the Gatewater - the police have closed it to everyone else, and Oldbag is being very...overzealous...in her attempt to keep people out. It will at least let you continue your investigation, if that is the course you see fit to take.”

Phoenix barely manages to take it, being so close to Edgeworth is playing havoc on his powers, and he nods quickly before heading out.

--

Salmone begins cursing at him again as Edgeworth lets out a breath. He tried to get Phoenix to look at him, to trust him again, but he doubts that will happen so soon after his return. He’s more concerned with how the small connection between each other keeps giving him flares of heat and ice, that the mention of de Killer has only made him all the more upset and confused and concerned. With the information, Phoenix might say that Andrews had the card because she got it from de Killer, after it was all done, but the odd extra feel he got from some things, the extra boost his powers had from being so connected to Phoenix, make him wonder.

“I heard you the first time,” he finally said, turning back to her. “I take it Marilyn finally told you everything.”

“You don’t get to bring my sister into this, you...you…” The rest of the word was even less flattering than what she normally called him, at least earlier in their acquaintance. “Do you know what you left here, what you did to--.”

“I didn’t know because I wasn’t aware of…” he stops and looks at her pointedly, “I wasn’t aware of how deep his feelings went. Just as your sister took a calculated gamble when she did her best to keep me from actual death.”

That gets Salmone to be silent with a near-audible click of her teeth, her face set and determined. “You know about that, then?”

“I and Gumshoe, yes. I heard last she was doing well.”

Salmone finally nodded slowly. “She woke up...two days ago. I suppose that was when you arrived here?”

He nods. “I haven’t had a chance to see her, though I am busy now, so I’ll have to put it off for a bit. That is, if you’ll allow it.”

Salmone glares at him before saying, “You will fix what is between you and Phoenix first.”

He lets out a breath, looking back at where Phoenix left. “That will be harder, Ms. Hari.”

“No, it--.”

“The...nature...of our...let’s say ‘rivalry’,” he looked at her again before she nods, “It’s not the same as the one between you and Marilyn. That one is more of a...sisterly...rivalry. Ours is far less...platonic, and has been there, in some form or another, for possibly years. The emotional turmoil of last year, for both of us, only made that rivalry deepen to the point that it was before I left…” he knows that others know about it, but saying it out loud feels hard. “...before I left, when I was going to declare my intent towards him as a partner.”

Salmone draws in a breath, looking wide-eyed as he continues, his voice low, “Something happened with Maya Fey. I believe she’s been kidnapped by de Killer.”

“You don’t know that, and if you think this will--.”

He glares at her, silencing her for once. “I am not doing this to win Phoenix back. What I know of our rivalry is that he hardly even thinks I’m the same person. Fressia’s presence has only left him sure I am not the same person.”

At least Fressia had left to go speak to Franziska again, or something, during the confrontation between himself and Phoenix. Salmone appears thoughtful as he adds, “We can’t find her without information, and I’m worried that pushing de Killer will mean he pushes Phoenix. He can’t be pushed at this time...Salmone, it’s important we figure this out and get what we can as far as the information is concerned.”

She looks at him before saying, “You fired Gumshoe to let him find out what he could, and then work through that to save Maya.”

Edgeworth crossed his arms in annoyance. “I hoped no one would see through that, especially since Franziska wanted to fire him anyway. But so long as Phoenix is the way he is, we have to work around him. I can’t help him if he doesn’t ask for it...as much as he needs our help.”

She looks him over for a very long moment, her eyes narrowed, before she gives him a nod. “I’ll help, because you will help Phoenix recover. But if he doesn’t, I know men who are not afraid of hurting a prosecutor.”

He lets out a sigh. “If I cannot do this, I doubt your men can do as good a job of hurting me as I will do to myself, Salmone. And I don’t have much time to lose, if I’m to not only save Andrews, but also Wright.”

Engarde’s Mansion - Living Room

Pearls is still asleep, and Gumshoe is just there watching her, so Phoenix goes to speak to Engarde. While he hates the idea of going to see him alone, what Edgeworth or the thing inside of Edgeworth said, as well as all the evidence he has, bothers him enough to wonder if he shouldn’t speak to Engarde again. He’s instead asked to go and feed Engarde’s pet cat, and after a brief call to tell Pearls and Gumshoe where he’d be, Phoenix heads to the apartment, located near the hotel but away from most of the other Global Studios homes that they normally kept for various actors or actresses.

And compared to Corrida’s large flower arrangements and bears, Engarde only had the most basic flowers from the studio and an impersonal note…

He does his best to not dwell on it as a chill runs up his spine, and he looks over to see the butler from before, the one who took Maya.

“Well well...you can see me,” the man said without even a smile, though his voice sounded like he thought the whole thing was surprising in the same way a birthday cake and presenters were surprising, “How very interesting.”

Phoenix glared at him, crumpling up the paper in his hand. It’s only his control that doesn’t have his power burn it all together. “He did hire you.”

“He did,” de Killer said, putting the tray he was holding down, “but to be fair, he is not the best client I have worked with, nor is he the type I enjoy dealing with either. At least with Shamans and Witches, they think they can trap you some other way. But this one...he enjoys sigils. He said this is perhaps his finest one. Not that I am prone to noticing what people like them do in their spare time - if he wants to draw up sigils and act like people are just components in a spell, that is up to the normal ones to figure out. You and I, though, are far from normal, wouldn’t you agree?”

Phoenix glared at him, his body tensing in the wish to attack the man who’d been hurting him, who had Maya as would do all he could to hurt her, when the spike suddenly dug into his shoulder, pulling out a hiss then a gasp of pain from him as de Killer said, “Let’s not do anything stupid just yet, Mr. Lawyer. We still have all this time to get acquainted.” He could hear the smirk in his voice as he said, “And I would so hate to speak up against my client or anything else. I should ask why you’re here...that acquittal should have come through by now. What even possessed you to help the other one you had pegged for the murder?”

Phoenix took in a few deep breaths, aware he was on his knees in front of this assassin, panting as his shoulder pulsed with pain, before he managed, “I...I couldn’t...the prosecution…”

“Ah...who was he?”

Phoenix gritted his teeth as the assassin glared at him, the pain flaring until he felt like his shoulder was being wrenched out of his socket before he managed to say, “I...don’t…”

“A name, Mr. Lawyer.”

“Don’t know...his real name.” It was the truth - whatever was in Edgeworth, he didn’t know their name. “He’s...the person...was…” he’s shaking in panic and fear of giving him such a name, and his power suddenly flares up, like a sunspot or a sudden gust of wind making the fire rise suddenly, and the assassin backs off, the pain going with him but not enough for Phoenix to stand, the power still holding him down as de Killer says, “I suppose I’ll figure that out later...he’s looking into me, isn’t he?”

Phoenix tries to remain silent but the twist of pain pulls out a hiss of, “Y...yes…” before he looks down, trying to not feel like he betrayed his friend. Even if the thing was wearing his friend, it was hard to distinguish the two sometimes, and Phoenix often felt like he was facing off against Edgeworth, not just the thing that was pretending to be him.

de Killer looks at him a long moment before he says, “You have the extra time you need. You will find Engarde innocent, and force the acquittal, or the one who gave you some form of sanctuary will die.” He pauses, considering, before saying, “Or...if you don’t get it, or cannot, I suppose you can always offer to give yourself over to me, after the acquittal.”

He looked up at him, surprised, and then shakes his head. “No.”

“You hardly even thought of that,” de Killer said, his tone calm and almost inquisitive, as if they were friends, “what have I to offer that your friends don’t?”

Phoenix managed a shaky, hard to pull-in breath, before he said, “I leave, and it’s not just the Shamans you have to worry about...there are others who want me here, who would rather have me here suffering. I disappear with you, and they’ll pool their influence to hunt you down.”

If the Shaman was Franziska von Karma’s sister, it would make sense why she would reanimate Edgeworth and have him working like this. That meant it wouldn’t be just the D’Arcy’s and Fey’s after de Killer. Plus, as much as he hate to admit it, he thinks perhaps his mother would take great offense to him being dead.

“Oh?” de Killer seemed both amused by Phoenix’s ability to still talk, as well as his half-threat. “Name one that I have to worry about?”

Phoenix sat back, managing to look the man in the eye, before he ground out, “My mother is Mikeyla Goffe.”

de Killer nearly stumbled back in fear and confusing, his eyes narrowing in anger before he hissed out. “You are the spawn of the Harpy?”

“I’m the reason she’s the Harpy,” he ground out, anger and fear over what could happen to Maya, or Pearl, or anyone else, making him bold and willing to admit to what his father and he had not wanted to believe for so long. He managed to slowly stand, using the wall to prop him up as his power rolled and boiled under his shields, the spike twisting painfully in his mind but unable to hold him down on this. “If you think she’s horrible enough, tracking down those she can and what she does to them...imagine what will happen if her son disappears.” That he and his father hadn’t been taken by the Goffes yet was still a question Phoenix never wanted the answer to, and he knew Drake was in the same boat as he was, though he possibly had a better idea as to why she’d left instead of dragging them in to be studied or whatever the Goffes did. Phoenix, when he’d learned of her true self, back in college, had hoped that it meant she did love him, that she didn’t expose them to whatever the missing went through. Drake, when he was able to still talk while drunk and apparently being tormented by his link to her, had quickly stopped any belief that such a thing was the case.

Phoenix knew what she did to them, and he didn’t hide that as he allowed the spike to see what he was thinking, and thus fed it to de Killer, who was now on a retreat. His powers rolled and fed off his anger and fear of it, his feeling of betrayal and heartbreak and self-loathing. If he’d only died then, she never would have become the Harpy, would have simply left Drake and never known about them. But instead, his power had manifested and attacked, saving him but damning everyone else to pain and misery, even destroying the family his grandmother had created years ago.

Phoenix is shaking as the pain disappears and de Killer gives him a slight bow, showing his respect for him as he adds, “I will not think to push you again, then. But don’t think I won’t keep my promise. The Shaman is only alive because you are still able to get an acquittal - the moment that is impossible, consider it the moment she is dead.”

Phoenix slowly manages a nod, finally saying, “You’d best actually call me on this - if you don’t, there will be suspicions, and I’m not answering any questions about you.”

Shelly de Killer smirked at his boldness, nodding in agreement. “Of course. Not that you could, anyway. No one besides those like the two of us actually see me.” He looks over him again, the sudden and unbidden lust and look like he’s only a body used to sire children, like he’s a prized horse or something, making Phoenix pale. “Our line would gain much from yours.”

“I disappear, a Harpy descends,” he reminded de Killer, his voice and feelings shaky with fear. “Not to mention the D’Arcy’s, von Karmas, and Feys. I doubt you want all of them on your tracks.”

He hummed before nodding. “True. You’d best go back to the investigation...if Engarde left enough behind, though, he’s doing himself and you a grave disservice. I told him what I demanded. If he doesn’t follow through, it’s on him and you that I am unable to fulfill my duty. Either way, the Shaman will die from it, and it will be on your head."

Chapter Text

Gatewater Hotel

8:35pm

Pearl is still asleep, or easily sleeps as they do their best to investigate the Gatewater. Gumshoe has taken to carrying her around, mostly piggy-back, or talking to others as Phoenix does his best to recover from the show-down against de Killer and the pain he’d inflicted. Calling up his mother’s name is not something he does often. He hasn’t ever really told Edgeworth or the others about her, and all the revelations he’d gotten in college – about what his power could do to a person, about his mother, and about why she did what she did.

That was his fault – Dahlia, his mother’s actions and transformation into the Harpy, all the people she’d hurt…all of that was his fault, and the fault of his power attempting to fight him or protect him. But at the same time, he has to at least save Maya, or do his best to get her back. The fact that Engarde was guilty as sin didn’t help his confidence, however, and he doesn’t really put up a fight when Frank takes the stuffed bear with that they’d found had a camera and transmitter in it’s eye.

Gumshoe’s departure to look for who had the camera leaves Pearls to him, and as much as he wants to comfort her, he’s too afraid to touch her at this moment. His power is rolling too badly, acting up too much, and his fear of what will happen because of that makes him withdrawn and almost shaky.

He can’t go and get drugs from Eldoon - there’s no time - and getting Maya back is a higher priority than his health anyway. He’s not going to survive the trial…

So he’s a bit surprised when Salmone scoops Pearls up into a hug, carrying her in a way that shows all the weeks of caring for various children of those in the Apartments have paid off, and she lets out a sigh. “Zhar-ptitsta, you shouldn’t look like that.”

Pearls looked at her, then yawned before she could try to repeat what Salmone had called him. Salmone smiled at her then looked back at Phoenix. “You shouldn’t run yourself so badly. There are plenty of people who can help you.”

All I do is hurt people, and it’s not like I have any friends...not anymore...He hadn’t had any real friends since...well, since Edgeworth, years ago. Larry was something like a friend, but he got into so much trouble and was so unreliable that Phoenix doubted he could ever count as that. Mia had been his lawyer, and then his mentor, and everyone else simply popped randomly into his life and left again after reminding him that he wasn’t all that good at what he did, not outside of hoping for a contradiction in the evidence he found, or pushing on some small thing. Maya might be a friend, if she wasn’t his employer and the one who Declared that he was under the protection of the Feys. He cared for her greatly, know she was important to him...but he doubted he held the same importance to her or anyone else.

“I can’t really do much beyond work this case,” he muttered, wishing to tell her. She wasn’t part of the cops that de Killer had singled out as the ‘don’t tell’, and the spike was not reacting as he said, “I have to get an acquittal, or Maya will be killed.”

Salmone looked upset over that, Pearls having given into her exhaustion and now asleep on her shoulder, as she told him, “You know that--.”

“I...I can’t. If he knows, I don’t want to think about what he’ll do to Maya.” He had backed off from going after Phoenix, but that didn’t change the fact that he’d possibly hurt Maya even with the acquittal. He already wasn’t feeding her or giving her water, and that only made Phoenix more aware of how dangerous things could be. And if the spike could be used against people with powers…

Salmone let out a sigh before she nodded, following him as he headed out and she followed, the two finally heading to the precinct in order to see about getting any additional information.

There was very little that could actually help them - Powers was now a witness as to Engarde’s character, and neither he nor Adrian wanted to talk about what happened with Celeste, though Phoenix could all but feel Adrian’s stress over the issue. He wants to point out how much he knows to Engarde, but in the face of five psyche-locks, he doesn’t know what will open them and finally reveal the man underneath.

His power is fighting him and expanding out, so he can feel the thing that Engarde is hiding, but barely. After a year of having it under every possible shield that he could, the sudden increase, feeling the hum of emotions all around him, was making Phoenix almost dizzy. He couldn’t remember if he’d taken his final pill or not, and almost didn’t want to risk taking it, not when the last few had left him nearly gagging as his power attempted to burst free and went into a backlash against him. At the same time, his mind is so messy and his feelings are so scattered that he can’t help but want it, if only to have his power under control and so he can focus.

They go back to Phoenix’s apartment to put Pearls to bed, Gumshoe arriving with the continued bad news of who had ordered the bear as well as the dead-end with the camera. Phoenix almost wants to give up, but he knows he can’t. He has to hold it together until at least the end of the trial, until he gets Maya back and until he can get somewhere alone.

“Will you be ok going there alone?” Salmone asked, looking back as she and Gumshoe wait, “I don’t like how things are going, zhar-ptitsta, and I don’t like the pressure you’re under.”

Everyone knows that Matt Engarde is guilty as sin. If Phoenix gets him an acquittal, he also knows that’s all he’ll be remembered for - the null that let a killer go free because of pressure.

“I need to find out the truth, Salmone,” he says finally, grateful he isn’t swaying or falling over, at least not yet, “and I know that it isn’t just about what Corrida was planning on doing. I need to hear it from him...and I need what happened between him and Celeste Inpax. I doubt he’ll spill that for anymore than just me.”

She looks at him seriously before finally nodding. “I’ll take care of little Pearl, then, but be careful.”

I’m already dying and about to win an acquittal for a man who hired a hitman to go after his rival, because they’re sore losers. I’m about to be remembered as fighting for a guilty man and tainting the memory of my mentor and all the others who don’t want to take cases where they don’t believe in their clients, even if everyone is supposed to get a fair trial.

I don’t have the time to be careful.

Police Precinct

Edgeworth is thankful for Salmone’s call, though he doubts she was happy with telling him. Even after the incident in the clinic, she trusts him enough to watch over Phoenix, or at least to try to fix the gap between them, and he can only hope that this time he’s able to at least make some repairs.

He dislikes using his privilege to gain some privacy to listen to Engarde as he’s speaking to Phoenix, but he also knows, and many of the guards know, that he won’t use it as testimony because the case is simply too well set against Engarde. Not to mention that, despite his ‘refreshing as a spring breeze’ persona he puts up when he’s being looked at, Engarde isn’t exactly that with the guards. He’s airheaded and uses that excuse to try to get away with things, and thus far none of them like him. One pointed out the obvious – he’s an actor, he doesn’t need to be like his character, the one he put on as the Nickel Samurai, or even the one he used for the media.

He pauses as he hears Engarde speaking, his voice sounding cold and more in line with his age and the way he acted, and he says to Phoenix, “Scandals are just the worse, aren’t they? I saw your own fold out fairly badly…but you came out with your skin on. Me…well, Juan didn’t exactly want to give me a chance to escape.”

“So the press conference…where he was going to do…”

“He was a sore loser in all things, and decided to try to take me out in the worse possible way. I enjoy my image - it lets me fool so many people - but Juan wasn’t about to let me get away with beating him again. If you think my image is distorted, you should’ve seen his...beloved by all his fans, but full of such lies about his manliness. At least when I decided to start looking like I wanted a girl, I let her know beforehand that I would not marry her or do anything so bad as get her pregnant or the like. I pretend I’m an airhead, some little kid with money who isn’t as spoiled as others might thing. Juan...he had everyone convinced he was a gentleman when in reality, he was just a sore loser.” He snorted, “You’re awfully quiet. Did what I just say break you?”

“I’m more amazed I was foolish enough to believe you than whatever story you tell yourself about why you had to kill someone,” Phoenix sounded defeated, and Edgeworth recalled his own voice sounding like that, right before he’d said he was guilty of murdering his own father.

“I’m sure you could always refuse to represent me…lawyers can do that, I’m sure. But then…that other ‘insurance’ I was promised and saw delivered in such a pretty package when you came here begging to represent me…” a short, harsh, and almost cruel laugh. “You’re the best type of component to a spell, Mister Lawyer. The type that no one thinks about, and when it’s put in, when it works…well, a null like you couldn’t ever know the feeling of exhilaration you get from that. No one’s gonna care that the Fey lady is gone at the moment, and no one will care what happened to you after you win. You’re expendable, like all the other components, and it’s wonderful to work with you.”

Engarde leaves, giving Edgeworth a chance to make his way in. Phoenix is still seated and looks defeated, as if the only reason he’s still remaining even semi-upright was maybe the chair, and that was a near thing. Edgeworth feels a sudden need to reach out and touch his shoulder, or do something to let him know that he’s really there, that what happened…

Phoenix slowly looks up at him, his eyes dull from their normal luster, and Edgeworth says quietly, afraid of how fragile his friend looks, “Let’s get out of here, Wright. The atmosphere isn’t good for talking. There’s a conference room upstairs that’s quiet.”

Phoenix finally nods, slowly standing, but Edgeworth had to move quickly when his friend’s knees buckled under him, nearly sending him to the ground. The brief touched only seemed to both chill and weaken Phoenix, to the point where Edgeworth had to continue touching by half-carrying, half-dragging him upstairs and into the conference room, grateful that not many officers were in the precinct at this time of night. Wright is shivering by the time they get there and Edgeworth helps him to his seat, as if focusing inward so much it’s leeching all of his natural heat. Edgeworth is grateful for the machine nearby that allows for a small cup of coffee or tea, and quickly sets about to make some mild tea for Phoenix. He doubt he’ll need coffee at the moment, not with everything that’s going on.

“Phoenix,” he finally goes to sit next to him, putting the cup down, “Phoenix, please…”

“why aren’t you gloating?” Phoenix asks, his voice quiet, “you were right. I didn’t really...but you were…”

“I’m not going to gloat about this,” Edgeworth says, hating how his friend sounds, “I wouldn’t, even before I left.”

“You died.”

“I was going to, but…” The conference room is so heavily sigiled and spelled that no one would hear what he had to say, but he still ensures it’s alright, that everything is working and no one would hear it (he thanks his time with Gumshoe and his insistence on Edgeworth at least knowing the signs, even if he can’t use them well), before he says, “I know that you created a link with me.”

If anything, Phoenix freezes even more, but now he looks panicked instead of simply out of it, and Edgeworth hurries, “I know because the link had to be severed by someone like you, who stopped me from doing something irreversible. I know it’s caused you pain, and to make you think I was dead. I know it...it’s what’s responsible for how you look now.”

He’s pretty sure that even without the added stress of Engarde’s confession, that Phoenix would have started to look like he did by the end of the case. He was pale, deathly pale, and his eyes barely even flickered with the same determination that had once colored them when he was facing anyone down. The added fact that he was occasionally shivering, not to mention his hands were only warm due to a cup of bad tea, made Edgeworth’s blame in all this all the more damning. Phoenix has been dying a slow death, and this trial is only making that all the more apparent to everyone.

“I know about Maya. I figured it out earlier today,” he tells Phoenix, noting how his friend seemed to wince at everything, “I put together a task force - they’re looking for her at this moment.”

“You don’t have anything to go on,” Phoenix says almost sullenly, “and why would you do that? Why are you doing this? You’re not him.”

Edgeworth lets out a long sigh, wishing there was a way to show Phoenix he was the same person, and remembering the small, barely-there thread of their connection, the one he’d only caught a bare glimpse of Phoenix’s pain from during the trial, he focuses on it. He’s not surprised to find it’s near his Fire Chakra, that it’s probably why that particular power now burns brighter, and he slowly gathers a small ember of Fire, of his own self, and pushes it over.

Phoenix starts so suddenly he drops the cup, the untouched tea spilling over the floor between them, as he finally, really looks at Edgeworth.

“I felt that, when I was depressed,” Edgeworth tells him. “I felt warmth and light and a call for me to stay, even if it seemed like it was just through a window. But that was my problem, Phoenix, not yours - I thought it was just that, seeing and feeling something I couldn’t have. I was too far gone for anything to bring me back...I was angry at you at first, when I realized what you’d done, what had happened. If I’d stayed here that year, if we’d had to deal with this without me knowing what type of prosecutor I wanted to be, without any of the personal insight I have, I would have done something even worse than dying, and I can’t allow myself to think of the various ways I could have…” he stops short of saying “turn you into your father”, because he doubts that would be fair, and he can feel a bit more from Phoenix, to the point where he wants to push as much of the Fire he can muster into him, but at the same time, he’s still seeing only flashes of fire in Phoenix, like embers slowly going out, and adding too much, too quickly, could only make the problem worse.

Phoenix looked at him a long moment before he finally blinked, his mind finally catching up with all he’d learned in the day. Edgeworth used that time to continue, telling him, “I had to do what I could so I would be strong enough to deal with anything that came up. I had to know what type of prosecutor I’m going to be, what it really means to be in that place and to either defend or prosecute someone.” He slowly reached over, watching Phoenix carefully, before finally  he had both of Phoenix’s hands clapped between his own. He was grateful to feel even the smallest bit of warmth that actually came from Phoenix, signalling that even if his normal heat hadn’t returned, the ember of it remained, and could be used to save him. He would keep that alive for as long as he could, however he could.

Phoenix looks down at their hands, and for a second, Edgeworth thinks he’ll pull away, that he’s going to reject what Edgeworth has said. Instead, he sees a mansion, a man with a scar running down his face, cutting in cleanly in two, and a name on the plaque.

“...you knew already.”

Something beeped, and Phoenix pulled out a hand to show a transceiver, the voice cold on the other end and almost too hard for Edgeworth to tell--

No, he could tell the voice. He could hear the different way it sounded, hear beyond it attempting to hide it’s identity, and was aware of how it was trying to do that as de Killer said, “I see my client decided to bare his soul. I also see you don’t quite approve.”

“I don’t, because he’s guilty and because I believe in my clients,” Phoenix said, “and I care for Maya Fey. You’ve hurt her, and me, and you’ve done your best to make me win something for a client I cannot and will not believe in.”

“You demonstrated what you can do while ill, Mr. Attorney. I’d hate to see you at full-form…” thoughtful pause, “No...that’s a lie. I would relish seeing you at full form. Despite all your threats, though, realize I am a man of my word. My clients expect me to take the blame, or for someone else to take it, or for the case to remain unsolved. This is what I suppose you could consider ‘aftercare’.”

Phoenix is quiet and Edgeworth hears something just before the transceiver cuts out...a meow…

“Engarde has a cat,” Phoenix says simply, and Edgeworth looks at him for only a moment before he stands, and pulls gently on his hand. “Come on.”

“...what?”

“You have to come with us...Maya doesn’t know I’m alive, remember?”

--

The search reveals that de Killer was at Engarde’s house, and knowing that Phoenix knew that, but was somehow unable to get Maya Fey back, worries Edgeworth enough that the threatens him with a call to Salmone (phone out and everything) before Phoenix just says that de Killer ensures his secrets are kept. He doesn’t ask about this, instead he and Phoenix look around, Edgeworth helping Phoenix knock down a door that’s locked and the two all but spilling into a spelled room that screams into Edgeworth’s senses, but seems even more designed for nulls or lower status people, because pain is ripping through Phoenix even more, enough that Edgeworth has to pull him out of the room and tell him to wait before he and another cop, one as capable as Gumshoe in sigils, goes in to defuse all the spells and traps and sigils. The computer and receiving equipment are obviously damning, and the wine cellar is so spelled but easily unlocked that finding the odd photo downstairs is confusing until he sees the name.

He walks out and is grateful to see that Phoenix remained in the living room and, while he wouldn’t take any medication for a headache, despite his shaking, he does drink a small glass of water before putting it down. His hands are shaking, and the pain is actually manageable, at least. Edgeworth shows him the photo, and is surprised when he takes it. He’s beginning to think that some of Phoenix’s powers, the ones that let him feel emotions, also works for some of the items, and he’s worried that maybe the spells, as well as whatever bad feelings can get attached to some things. He isn’t sure of all of Phoenix’s abilities, beyond fire and emotion, and he watches him look it over, reading something on the back of the photo, before he says, “I need to go and speak to Ms. Andrews.”

Edgeworth nods, leaving the task for to their job of working to block of any of de Killer’s routes out of town and to search for Maya Fey as he drives them back, Phoenix looking at the photo for a long moment as they drive before he finally speaks, as they get close to the precinct again. “He cared for her.”

“Who?”

“...engarde. I don’t feel...there’s no malice on this photo, none of...what he is. he didn’t love her...but he didn’t hate her either.”

Edgeworth keeps that in mind as they call Adrian Andrews in, Phoenix playing with an odd, glowing item that Edgeworth guesses is the item Maya Fey gave him when he became declared to the Fey lineage, and asks about the reason she would frame Engarde, finally settling on, “He hurt Celeste as much as Corrida did, didn’t he?”

Something seems to change in her, and Phoenix puts the item away as she says, “Yes.”

--

Celeste didn’t love Engarde. She made that clear to Adrian the only time she gained enough strength to tell her anything. “You don’t love men like that, Adrian. They are dangerous and cruel, and it’s only someone who can deal with such a thing who might be able to handle them, without becoming dangerous or cruel themselves.”

“Then...then why…”

“I’m his manager, and to be fair,” she closed the book she’d been studying, the time table of his appoints and schedules, “for being such a dangerous man, he is also practical. We are not the type to get attached, he or I. He sees people as tools, as pieces of a sigil or spell. I’ll end up becoming attached to someone, one day.”

Adrian had blushed, and secretly wished it would be her.

Adrian never knows for certain why she left, though Matt had simply said she was offered a better deal with Worldwide and he hadn’t stopped her from leaving.

“You’re as good as she is,” he pointed out with a shrug, “and who am I to stop her from advancing, dude? I like her too much for that.”

“You don’t like anyone.”

He shrugged at that, still looking his clueless self, “Maybe, but I ain’t gonna stop her or you from bein’ happy because of it.”

For someone who could and would make someone’s life miserable in small, bad ways, Matt was at least true to his word. That was before Corrida and he decided to have a dick-measuring contest.

Corrida was, in Andrian’s mind, as much of a monster as Matt, but Matt was honest enough that he didn’t gather devoted followers or those stupid teddy bears.

But after Corrida managed the first one-up, and gloated the way he had, Matt got worse.

“It’s natural,” Celeste told her over the phone, when she’d finally given in and called her, “Juan is acting a sweetheart...he apologized, said he got too carried away. He swore it won’t happen again.”

That should have been her first clue, but Adrian ignored it and thought better of Juan, because Celeste thought better of him. Matt was nice enough to never bring them into any sort of confrontation - every battle was between him and Juan. Once, when he was being truthful, he told her, “If I need to use people, I will. But I can beat him anyway that I want...there’s no reason to be snippy or mean like that.”

Then, Celeste met Adrian for lunch, and was so happy that Adrian was happy for her, and showed her the ring - white-gold with diamonds, and a pretty black opal, a powerful stone, in the middle.

“He proposed, Adrian! I’m going to be Mrs. Corrida!”

“Celeste! That’s wonderful news! I’m so happy for you both.”

“We’re going to announce the engagement tomorrow. Oh Adrian...I know he and Matt don’t get along, and we can’t see much of each other, but I’m so happy there was no bad blood left behind with Matt after I left.”

Adrian frowned at that later, alone, and only saw something that worried her later, when the announcement was put out, bigger and better news...beating out the announcement of Matt’s new role, a big one as well.

Matt is congratulatory to them both. She doesn’t know when he tells Corrida that she was once his manager, something that should have been well-known, that Adrian knows Celeste would tell Corrida...and this was long before the two became rivals, long before they started fighting and spying and attempting to get the better of each other and prove themselves in some macho dick-measuring contest.

Three days later, Celeste calls up, distraught and upset, and she tells Adrian, “I fell for the charms of an insidious man.”

“Who? Which one did this to you?”

“Does it matter?” Celeste asked, “They’re both monsters. They looked me in the eyes and lied to me.” A long silence. “I was such a fool, Adrian. To fall for such monsters and think I could change them.”

Corrida was...nice enough...to tell Adrian first about the death and how there was no suicide note. Matt was ‘nice enough’ to cover up her attempted suicide.

Adrian hated them both.

Chapter Text

March 23, 2017

District Courthouse

Phoenix hadn’t gotten any sleep last night. Much of it was too filled with terrible dreams, or visions of a tundra on fire, or anything else to remind him of the ticking time bomb within his own mind. He’s got more things to worry about now though, beyond Engarde attempting a cruel joke and Mia saying Maya hadn’t contacted her, or even Salmone scaring away Matt as he mutters something about the Russian Mafia.

“за любовь Христа, who believes that rumor still?” Salmone muttered.

“You mean you didn’t gain control of your husband’s mafia empire after his death?” Mia asked, apparently confused despite the situation, but he’s grateful for the distraction and the diversion from him. He has to go today and prove a killer innocent, or he’ll never see Maya…

And if he does do that…

If you let him go without a guilty plea, I’ll never forgive you, Maya had written on the back of that photo, I don’t care what happens to me, but if you let him go free...

“мой нет-хороший муж couldn’t have run a mob group if he tried. And they’re not about to listen to a woman, even if she took over their bar and the comedy club and угрожали им отравленный борщ.”

“I’m pretty sure the last one was completely illegal and that’s the only reason you said it in Russian.”

“Mia Fey, ты слишком хорошо меня знаешь.”

I have to prove him innocent, but then I’ll lose Maya...but if I don’t find him innocent, then she’ll die. Either way, I’ll lose her...it’s my fault all of this is happening, that Andrew’s story is being dragged out and that Maya is in danger. Because I couldn’t find the real culprit, because I couldn’t focus after all that happened, because I’m what I am, someone could be put into jail for a crime they didn’t commit and Maya will leave me because I’m the one that put her in that position – kidnapped and held and unable to save someone.

I can’t…I can’t…

The sound of the door opening brought Phoenix back to reality, seeing that Mia was still there but Salmone had headed to the gallery. She’s waiting for him to stand when he spots a small bag labeled for him. Phoenix slowly picks it up and looks inside, his hands shaking as he sees the contents and the note.

“This should get you through the trial,” was written in block letters, the scrawl hardly showing any personality or way to trace it. He can feel some sort of smugness in the writing, and he knows exactly what the capped bottle at the bottom of the bag is. Even with Mia watching, he finds himself reaching in quickly, pulling it out and freezing when he sees the label, his hands shaking both with need but also with memories that are too mixed up for him to properly put emotions to.

“I lost it…” Phoenix sneezed violently, disliking the after effects of a missed dosage and the cold weather. He’d been so careful, been grateful to get something that wouldn’t mess with his powers and would let him at least walk into the art building without feeling ill...and it let him be near Dollie. He was so happy about that part, so grateful that he could please her in that way as well, even if she sometimes appeared bored or upset when he admitted he didn’t think he could give that necklace she’d given them on their first encounter back. But between the continued rain and the cold that came with it, his body had been unprepared, his already-drowned powers had not been able to keep him from a severe cold, and now he sniffed and tried his best to not sneeze near his Dollie and give her the cold he’d gotten.

“Oh? What?”

“My Coldkiller-X...I--” another violent sneeze, “I need it, especially with this-” she shifted away as three sneezes came out in quick succession, leaving him feeling miserable as she gave him a look of near-annoyance, a look she tended to give him when he was an idiot and forgot something, before smiling sweetly at him, her umbrella folded inside and twirling in her hand.

“I can go get it for you, Feenie. Where’d you leave it?”

He doesn’t see it again until the trial, when it’s shown to prove that he’s responsible for Doug’s death, right before Dollie takes the stand...

He drops the bottle of Coldkiller X back into the bag, and shoves it into the trash with as much force as he can, surprised when it doesn’t catch on fire. He starts to head in as Mia stops him, saying, “Phoenix...you know that you have people who are going to help you, right? Gumshoe is going to do his best to find Maya and de Killer. You have to have faith that this will turn out--.”

“It’s not going to ‘turn out’ the way I want, Chief,” he tells her, interrupting her attempt to cheer him up, “it just isn’t. There no way for it to turn out for the best or whatever you were going to say. All I can hope is that Maya comes out of this alive.”

Mia looked upset over what he said, and lets out a sigh. “I want everyone to come out of this alive, Phoenix. Especially you.”

He doesn’t tell her that such a thing isn’t going to happen, and instead heads into the courtroom, hoping for some small way to salvage this case.

It’s not good. Even with Powers being a bit all over the place, what little he recalls of the bellboy is enough to throw suspicion not only  onto the bellboy, but also onto Engardge. There’s no way for him to move the suspicion either - Edgeworth has everything he needs to get Engarde on hiring an assassin, and Phoenix has nothing to counter it, not even a good bluff. He knows that Edgeworth didn’t coach Powers, and that most of what he remembered was hard-fought as well. Phoenix didn’t know what powers or whatever they were that de Killer had, but he knew it made him hard to remember, even if his look was very distinctive. He doubted anyone else could recall his actual looks, and the fact that Powers struggled with it told him that only someone like Phoenix (touched, Lotta had said, over a year ago, and Hotti had claimed the same thing a few months before, when he’d been working to save Maya from jail and death) could tell.

That only means he can easily escape, no matter what Edgeworth or his men do. There’s no way to catch him, to stop him from whatever he wants to do…

Maya, I’m so sorry...but we weren’t going to see each other again anyway…

--

Mia wished for the anger and ability to throw a curse at Edgeworth. She’d managed a way around the spells to keep her out, but that had taken a lot of talk with the bailiffs, and all she could do was help and advice Phoenix if he needed it. Right now, there was nothing she could do to help him - he was stuck, and he wasn’t willing to see a way out. She’s not surprised either, at his inability to see a way out of the mess they’re in...nearly all of his chakras are dark, and she’s would be amazed if he didn’t fall over dead by the end of this. The only ones still working, even marginally, were his Fire and Metal chakras, and the Metal one was sputtering into the same oblivion that the others had gone into since yesterday. She at least counts Phoenix’s ability to look at Edgeworth as a win, but beyond that, she wants nothing more than to curse him a bit, or maybe call up Fawles just to pull out someone else that Edgeworth failed.

I failed him too, she thought unhappily as she watched Phoenix attempt to get even a bit of ground with Power’s testimony, I was unable to get him to trust me, I didn’t see the thing that she’d put on the necklace, didn’t realize what power that damned woman had...not until I saw the same necklace that Phoenix had…

And he’d nearly died too, because she’d been so blinded by trying to show that woman’s evil and by her anger at what happened to Diego. When Phoenix had asked to become her understudy and work with her, after everything that happened, she’d taken him in without any hesitation. She trusted him with a great deal of things, but she’s not sure if she can trust him to do what is really right in this trial, not with the mentality he’s in and not with how things have been going. It also doesn’t help that no matter what objection is raised, the crowd already wants Engarde’s head.

She blinks when the cry gets loud enough to make it past the sound buffer, seeing his chakras begin to sputter and fail, her fear as she sees him standing with his hands planted, more to keep him upright than to keep the determined stand he’s been holding as he raises his objections over the smallest points that he can find, all countered by Edgeworth, who hasn’t even bothered to notice what his attacks are doing to Phoenix. Mia is panicking, wishing she knew what to do--

SIS!

She freezes at the call, at the desperation as she finally leaves Pearl, just as Edgeworth says, his tone cold, “We should look at all avenues, after all, and I’m curious as to what in the bear as well...a recess…”

Then she’s in Maya’s body, looking out through a window to a circus tent, feeling the cold air stirring up dust as she saw a mailbox underneath, and felt Maya’s hunger and fear. She knows it’s enough, though, at least enough to possibly give them a lead to where Maya is, and she flies back to where Pearl is speaking to Phoenix.

The few minutes she’s been gone only left Pearl upset and tired, and right now, Phoenix looks ready to pass out, only his Fire chakra is even showing signs of life, a bare ember of what she’d seen when she’d first come back, when she’d first arrived to call down her wrath on White for what he’d done and what he was trying to do. He was on the phone, and her quick instructions of what she’d seen was enough for him to straighten a little, telling Gumshoe over the phone what Mia had seen before he’s forced to hang up. He’s shaking as he stands, pale and hardly his normal self. He almost crumbles over before something odd happens.

A sudden, odd burst of warmth wraps around Phoenix’s chakras, a blue-red fire that appears for only a brief moment. She watches as his shaking stops, as some color comes back to his face...before the warmth is doused so quickly that it was hardly even there, though at least his Fire chakra gained more heat, and he stopped shaking and looking so ill as he glances at the doors, still looking resigned to whatever was going on, as well as worried and almost reluctant to go back in.

“Phoenix, we--.”

“I need to finish this,” he said firmly, his resolution to what he was doing obvious in his voice, “I have to finish this, no matter what. I have to get Maya back…”

She let out a sigh, hating how single-minded he was in this, and hating Miles Edgeworth for making him so.

--

Fressia and Franziska are obviously upset with him, the two step-siblings giving him a look that said neither were enjoying how things had gone. He knew that he wasn’t enjoying it either - Phoenix had almost fallen over from the anger that the people watching had shoved at him, and though Edgeworth wanted nothing more than to shove as much warmth and whatever else he could at Phoenix, almost none of what he attempted to give him was received. For all that had been said yesterday, Phoenix was still too focused on doing what de Killer had demanded...and that left Edgeworth trying to finish the case while also knowing that it was only a matter of time before de Killer, and thus Maya, was found.

“You need to stop pushing so hard, Miles,” Fressia told him, her gray eyes serious as they waited for the recess to be over, Franziska speaking quietly to a depressed Adrian Andrews.

“I needed Wright to see the truth,” he said, even though Wright had known this truth and, apparently, knew it painfully, “and he needs to get out of working for Engarde. Ending this trial is the quickest way for that.”

“A quicker way is waiting to hear back from the task force,” Fressia pointed out, “if Maya Fey dies, he isn’t about to forgive you.”

Edgeworth knew that. He wasn’t going to forgive himself is Maya Fey died because of his hurry to get a verdict. His problem was getting de Killer to mess up, or at least to set up everything so Engarde was declared guilty no matter what he chose. He’d taken up calling Andrews because knowing what was inside the bear figurine could easily gain his final win. He also hated that doing this was making him look even more cold-hearted then he really was.

Phoenix’s abilities allowed him to feel the anger of the court, the Judge, and anyone else. Something was making it go so haywire that Edgeworth could feel some of it leaking through, just as much as he felt the continued mantra of Maya Fey’s name.

It worried him, even if he couldn’t stop with his attacks. He had no choice but to hope things worked out, but he doubted they would.

Right before they headed in, he sent another burst of warmth towards Wright, frowning as it failed to connect with him. He was probably being so unforgiving because Phoenix wasn’t trusting him to at least help him through this, and take on some of the pain and suffering he was feeling. Edgeworth had no doubt that if Phoenix did trust him with that, they might even get de Killer out of this…

“Miles,” Franziska spoke up, causing him to turn to his sister, “I expect you to not make a fool of yourself out there. Wright is taking these foolish risks for a reason.”

“I know that,” he said, “and I know I am being...foolishly harsh. I simply want him to realize he can trust me, and I’m not sure how else to do it.”

She is quiet before saying, “Play along. Actually keep the game going. I can’t believe you didn’t figure that out before, you fool.”

He smiled a bit at that. “I’ll do my best, and try to keep your own foolish friend out of trouble.”

Franziska glared at him, not bothering to pull at her whip, as her arm was still healing. “She’s not my friend, though she is foolish and needs someone to cure her of it. At least I won’t lead her on like that fool of a manager she foolishly followed around.”

He doesn’t comment on that, recalling the report about Inpax’s death and Adrian’s suicide attempt. He also remembers how Phoenix had asked that question, and how...odd...he’d looked.

He also remembered, and hated that he’d seen, the odd, distorted image of a familiar woman with red hair and a white umbrella, walking ahead of someone.

What does that woman have to do with anything, and why was it something Phoenix thought about when Adrian mentioned Celeste being ‘used’ by those two?

Edgeworth began by bringing back the focus to the bear, knowing it would be important to figuring out the killer and also clearing up everything.

“Have you seen this bear before?” Edgeworth asked after quickly running down why she was here.

“Yes, of course I have,” she said, and he recalled what she’d told him. “It was something Celeste bought - one for me, and one for Corrida. Mine was destroyed...I destroyed it, but Corrida still had it, when I went to try to speak to him.”

“Why did he have it?” he’d asked, Franziska also looking curious.

“Because,” she said seriously, “it’s a puzzle...and because then, he could tell me it was where he put Celeste’s suicide note for safekeeping.”

Another way to hurt her, to toy with someone in the continued battle between Corrida and Engarde...and that explained why Engarde would want it, even if he didn’t know how to open it just yet.

Her testimony continued with that - she knew how to take the bear apart, and though she didn’t mention that Celeste Inpax had gotten it, she did say that it was something she and Juan Corrida knew how to take apart. After the cross-examination, mostly just to establish more about the bear, before he had her open it to reveal what they knew to be inside.

Phoenix wouldn’t go near that note, and Edgeworth could feel some of the feelings as well, frowning as he saw it wasn’t pain or anguish, but something...darker. Not anything that he’d felt when he’d been suicidal, but instead something that made him recall what she’d said about Corrida and Engarde.

Monsters, she said about them, and how she’d hated them both for hurting Celeste Inpax.

Corrida found her note...and instead did his best to say that this was all Engarde’s fault for her suicide.

I doubt we’ll ever find the real note and give Ms. Andrews the closure she needs, then. I think she knows that now as well.

Andrew’s wish to destroy the note seemed to point to either her wanting to protect Celeste, or knowing it was a fake anyway. Edgeworth knows that the contents will give them a motive for Corrida’s murder, as well as give Phoenix a bit of an edge. It will allow him something to argue on, but…

We don’t have the time to deal with this. The task force could have easily gotten Maya Fey out by--

wait...they don’t...Maya is still…

Edgeworth tried his best to not glare at Phoenix as the note was read by the Judge, Andrews looking upset and then angry as it continued. He hadn’t trusted Phoenix, hadn’t allowed whatever connection had started between them to grow as it should, and that ended with him nearly killing himself and having to leave for a year and some months, ended up with him failing to find a way to help Phoenix and instead left something that was resulting in Phoenix’s slow death. If Phoenix didn’t trust him a little, no matter what their past, then Edgeworth knew that everything he was working towards - figuring out a new way to prosecute, working to help Phoenix realizing what needed to be done, saving Maya Fey from de Killer - all of that would fall down.

He couldn’t lose Phoenix to his friend’s fear and inability to trust, not right now. He needed to at least figure out some way to get through to Phoenix and get enough of a connection that maybe, he could keep Phoenix alive long enough to heal him.

Breaking the connection and failing to realize all that Phoenix was to him, as well as all his own problems, had meant Edgeworth had to relearn everything, had to figure out what it was that Phoenix had really been telling him, and it had all but ruined their friendship. He needed to rebuild that, and get Phoenix’s trust.

I didn’t trust you to save me when I should have...I shouldn’t expect you to trust me now...but I need you do that. I need you to believe that we can do this, not just me pointing out the truth, not you working to pull out a dirty trick to save Maya on your own. Trust me enough to help you, Phoenix. Please.

Edgeworth doubts that Corrida would have withheld the notes, win or not, after the Hero of Heroes ceremony. The contents and the motive is enough to bring back the anger and disgust that points more towards Phoenix than Engarde, and he hates even the barest feeling he gets from it, over the small connection and the added power that such a connection gave him.

He sees Mia muttering something, and the continued push of Maya, I have to wait for word only makes Edgeworth send a glare to the ghost that stands at Phoenix’s side. Can’t she rest in peace and leave him to fight his own battles, or better yet, go to try and help her sister?

She returns his glare as Phoenix goes for what he can hope to get - trying to buy time that Edgeworth knows he doesn’t quite have. It at least stops the muttering from being angry and resentful towards Phoenix, and Edgeworth is beginning to see the reason for some places to still keep juries, or at least not allow talking or muttering during a case.

He has to cut down Phoenix’s attempt to explain away the suicide note as a motive, pointing out that Corrida and Engarde had been spying on each other, and thus would know about what the other planned (apparently up to a point) before Phoenix now pointed out that Inpax’s note sounded far too one-sided.

“It doesn’t seem like she has anything to say about the man that so carelessly stopped their engagement simply because his rival said they’d been intimate,” he pointed out, “so how can we know it’s the real note? If it is, than why didn’t Corrida simply release it when Inpax died, and ruined my client then? Not to mention that the only other person who could open this bear was Ms. Andrews, meaning that unless we know if the note is a fake or not, she could have easily written it and put it inside to frame my client.”

He has a point, and Edgeworth knows that it’s enough to work with, even if the crowd doesn’t...not to mention that it could help his own case anyway.

But if it has to be, it could also be turned against Adrian Andrews.

Not likely - there’s hardly enough evidence to link her to the murder beyond coincidence, but Phoenix makes a valid point, one that Edgeworth is ready to give a brief recess so they can get the answers they need, and the time that Phoenix obviously needs, even if the audience is calling for Engarde’s head. There goes his “refreshing as a spring breeze” look...

“We can easily get the answers that the court needs and clear this up,” he points out, “I would much rather we know for certain than simply leave the issue hanging. We can do this in thirty minutes - that’s all I ask.”

The Judge at least agrees to the thirty minute recess as the audience sounds annoyed by the continued trial, the tide of emotions that are directed at Phoenix getting bad as Edgeworth goes to send the note away to be examined before heading over to the defendant’s lobby, grateful that Engarde isn’t around when he arrives, but unhappy as Mia stops him, Phoenix sitting and on the phone, listening as his emotions run a gauntlet.

“What do you think you’re pulling here, Edgeworth?” Mia asks, continuing to glare at him.

“I’m finding out the truth of the matter,” he said, “and I’m hoping that Phoenix or someone can at least tell me what’s going on so I have a better idea of what the plan is. As far as I know, the task force--.”

“Has been failing miserably, koyzol,” Salmone says, coming up and sending Mia a brief glance before glaring at him, “that’s why zhar-ptitsta has been doing his best to prolong the trial.”

“Oh, good, one of you is at least telling me what’s going on, since Phoenix can’t.” He sees Phoenix send him a quick, almost grateful, look as he adds, mostly to Mia, “If you want so badly to help, go and find Maya and give us more clues. Otherwise, stop acting holier-than-thou. It didn’t work the first time we met, and it certainly doesn’t work for you now.”

Salmone at least managed a small smile at that as Mia looked annoyed at him.

“He’s got a point, Mia,” she said, “we need to help out if zhar-ptitsta cannot.”

Mia is silent, glaring at him, and Edgeworth finally says, “I am not responsible for what happened in that trial. I was told to prove something, and you were told to prove otherwise. We both failed and that woman went free. Are you going to carry that grudge until the same thing happens again?”

“GUMSHOE!” the yell get them both to stop glaring at look at Phoenix, who is holding his phone away and attempting to get in contact with the other line before he starts shaking. Edgeworth moves, touching him briefly and feeling the anxiety in a sudden, huge wave, before he works to calm him, verbally and through the barely-there connection they still have. “Phoenix, what happened?”

“Gumshoe has three pieces of evidence,” he manages, speaking as images rush through his mind, along with feelings that are almost too numerous to give a name too and far too hectic for Edgeworth to even deal with properly as he attempts to calm Phoenix down, “but he got in a car wreck coming here. I don’t...I…”

those three might help us…

but we don’t know where he was or where the car wreck was.

...but she…(an image of Franziska holding a tracker, a beeping noise whenever she got closer to Gumshoe)...she could…

Franziska had been itching to get something done, and he nods before saying, “We can get it in time, Phoenix.”

no time...m--

“We have thirty minutes, Phoenix, and whatever was left by de Killer, we can possibly use it so long as the cops don’t get it first.” He glanced at Salmone. “Call Franziska and tell her to find Gumshoe, as well as get here with the evidence. I don’t think she has--.”

“You deal with that, I’ll deal with your sister and her attitude,” Salmone said simply, taking his phone and dialing the number before starting to talk a bit further away. Mia was silent and watching them, but at least she was leaving him to try to calm Phoenix down as a wave of despair hit him.

I don’t have any right to judge anyone...I knew he was guilty...I felt that death and I didn’t…

What would you have done?

I could have…

What would you have done, really? You can’t face against de Killer as you are now.

...I knew he was guilty, and if I hadn’t...what I’m doing now...pinning the guilt on Andrews and using that evidence to do so...why didn’t I die sooner, before all this...

“Stop that,” Edgeworth said quietly, hating the despair and unshed tears in his friend’s eyes, “if you had, I would have never gotten the chance to apologize. I haven’t gotten that chance yet. You can’t die...not until I finally, properly apologized for not understanding and trusting you. I know where you’re coming from, I know how that feels…” He remembers his anger and disgust at himself, his wonder at how many he put away in pursuit of a ‘perfect record’...but that wasn’t the same thing as being pushed into such a verdict by the loss of a friend and the threats of a killer.

“I...I failed…”

“The verdict hasn’t come down yet, and we still have time,” Edgeworth told him, “No matter what, remember that.” We have time to change this around, Phoenix. TRUST ME. It’s a lot, it’s too much, but I need you to trust me enough for just this case. Please…

the verdict...maya...I…

Of course a bailiff chooses that time to tell him there’s an urgent call, and he doubts it’s about the handwriting, but he still hopes it is. He slowly stands, his hand still on Phoenix’s shoulder, and he pauses to turn and look at him, touching his cheek as his friend looks down at the ground, the waves of despair so familiar.

I never should have left, Phoenix. I’m sorry. We have to work to get this case finished, and to get something that will make the verdict one you can live with.

i lose maya either way...no point…

There is. Believe me, there always is, even if right now, you can’t see it.

Chapter Text

Edgeworth knows it’s a gamble to call de Killer directly, but Phoenix can easily guess as to why he’s doing it. With the note shown as a fake as written by Mr. Corrida, the question now becomes who de Killer’s client is, and with everything at an impasse, it’s the only avenue available to them.

Phoenix isn’t surprised that Edgeworth stutters before he announces the decision either. This is someone that can easily elude the police and who is a known killer of a long line of assassins. Phoenix does his best to not think of the spike that seems to twist with glee in his mind as he agrees, the two-way transceiver Edgeworth was given now up on the witness stand before it clicked and spoke at Edgeworth’s stuttered questions.

I wonder if he can feel the twisting pain that you can, de Killer’s cool voice sounded in Phoenix’s mind as he kept himself straight, trying to hide the pain as it flared through his shoulder and in his mind. He’s grateful that Edgeworth doesn’t notice - he’s been doing his best to help Phoenix out, to tell him all that he can, but at the same time, Phoenix doesn’t see the reason for all his attempts. He’s going to die at the end of this, and nothing Edgeworth does will change that fact.

He’s quite the frightened young lamb, that prosecutor. He gave into my conditions so easily...one wonders if he’s not trying to help you…

If you want me to work, then let me work, Phoenix thinks hatefully at the spike and the cool voice as the Judge attempts to point out that they don’t know if that’s de Killer or not.

Edgeworth looks upset as he asks for proof, and there’s a cool chuckle in Phoenix’s mind before Maya’s voice comes over the radio. “I’m...cold...hungry...Nick…”

Mia stiffens at her voice and Phoenix quickly says, “The defense as no objections to this witness! We’re satisfied that this man is--”

“I’m not done showing what I can do…”

Phoenix doubled over in pain as the spike twisted and pulled, barely managing to hold in a scream at the pain as Mia looked at him in horror, Edgeworth straightening as de Killer said, “I’m here to speak as I choose, and explain who my client is. But I must say, this particular lawyer has given me some problems. You’ll excuse me if I use this time to show my abilities, so you understand how serious I am.”

A final, almost vengeful twist pulled out a startled gasp and near-scream from Wright before the Judge said, “We’re satisfied that you are who you say you are!”

“Very good.” The twist stopped and Phoenix stood hunched over the box he normally stood in, shaking and trying to focus, his powers rolling under the last remaining bit of tundra, ice, and water he held it under, the only thing that stopped him from hurting people again and again. He doesn’t doubt that once it breaks, he’ll die, and he doesn’t want to take anyone with him. That’s why he needs to get this over with and leave, go to that bridge and maybe jump. At least if he’s consumed in flames, the icy water will keep it from spreading and hurting anyone else.

De Killer gives his testimony in a vague way, leaving Phoenix to carefully question what he said - most of it seemed to simply be reasoning for why he’s giving his client’s name, though something about it seems to stick with Phoenix as they speak.

He trusts his clients...but…

He stops the thought before it can go any further, instead listening as de Killer goes on to say that his client has disobeyed the rules set out for them, and that was the only reason he was talking to them and willing to admit who they were. As much as Phoenix didn’t want to speak to de Killer, he forced himself to ask, finally pointing out what he said as de Killer answered him.

“A person who frames another is the worst kind of human, in my mind.”

“Which is why you can ‘betray’ this person?” Phoenix asked, knowing what de Killer is pulling but careful to not think it or push too much.

“I have no trust relation with a client who can’t understand their assigned role. Since I believe I’ve explained my logic, I can disclose the information you seek…”

“You made it crystal clear you value trust between yourself and the client over all else,” Edgeworth said, his earlier awkwardness now lost as he had his arms crossed, waiting for the information to come before saying simply, “So tell us the name of the client who asked for the death of Mr. Juan Corrida.”

“Very well…the name of my client is…” there was a long pause before he said, “Adrian Andrews.”

“WHAT?” everyone yelled as Edgeworth glared at the transceiver. Phoenix can almost hear de Killer’s dark chuckle in the back of his head, but he ignores it and instead tries to focus through what he knows has to happen, his eyes going to lock on Edgeworth’s before he finds the small thread that still connects them, thinking only to him and not letting anything stay in his own mind for long.

He only says that…treat him like another witness.

Phoenix, he used his power to hurt you. I won’t let him do it again!

I can handle whatever he throws at me. Stop acting like this is the end and think. Everything we have, which one does it point to? Think outside the box, outside of being a prosecutor.

Silence as de Killer said over the radio, “My testimony is the truth. The defendant at the moment is Matt Engarde, correct? I wish to help procure his acquittal.”

That evidence we found…it is circumstantial, and proving she tampered with the crime scene only makes her look guiltier…

So treat de Killer like a witness.

The box filled with spectators quickly speaks loud enough to get through some of the muffling spells, the Judge calming them down as he laid out the facts that they both knew – enough of the evidence made Andrews look like the actual killer, while Engarde was simply someone who was innocent and a victim of circumstance.

So now what?

What do we have that can bring focus back to Engarde?

A list of what he knew about de Killer seemed to rattle in his mind, along with Edgeworth’s own, and they paused as they looked at the most telling part…his ‘trust’ between himself and his client.

He’s like me, but not, Phoenix thought quickly, trying to work around the spike in his mind, but he has his flaws as well…things he can’t see around.

He’s not at all like…you…Edgeworth straightened as Andrews was called back, he’s like me.

Huh?

Ignore what he can do and instead how he acts. He acts like a high-level…he’s sure of himself, he’s sure that what he sees is the truth and that his client won’t try to take advantage of him…that he can trust them. How would he be able to?

Phoenix briefly thought of the spike, and how it got there, and Edgeworth glanced at the radio but then thought, That we can’t test for. But we can test him.

How?

He’d do his best to make it seem like Andrews is his client…how well does he know everyone in this case, though?

Phoenix didn’t know. He hoped it was ‘not well’ as he gave Edgeworth one last look before Edgeworth said, “I would like to have the witness, Shelly de Killer, testify again.”

“It wasn’t me!” Andrews said when she came up, “I swear! He was lying – even if that suicide note was a fake, even if they’re the reason she died, I…that testimony was a lie, you have to believe me…it was a horrible, horrible lie…”

The Judge was not sympathetic, and Edgeworth glanced over at Phoenix. The spike twisted as he waited, as if waiting to see what he’d do and if it had to pull out more pain from him or if he’s allow the trial to end where de Killer wanted it to end.

“Phoenix…” Mia said as he let out a breath and glanced at her. “You’re a lawyer.”

“You’re right,” he said simply, “and I’m going to do what I know is right. I can’t let Andrews take the fall, and it’s because of Edgeworth and his pushing that I ever found out the truth…and it’s also because of him that we’ve even gotten this far in the trial. I know you don’t like him for whatever reason, Chief, but taking that verdict right now is…it…”

He doesn’t want to be dramatic and say he’ll have to do the same thing that Edgeworth did, declare his death and disappear…but he knows that he’ll die with a guilty conscious, and that no one will look for him. Despite how he might feel, despite the fact that he doesn’t have any real friends, he still would like the thought that his disappearance would mean someone would notice.

Edgeworth is waiting for his move, as it’s up to Phoenix to decide to continue on or not, and a sudden rush of realization goes through him as he looks at his friend.

I trust him…after all that’s happened, all he’s changed and all I thought I hated him this year, I trust him to do this, to help me with this, and to get the truth out…

The spike twisted painfully as he said, “I agree with Mr. Edgeworth, Your Honor. We should have Mr. de Killer testify again.”

“B-but he just proved your client innocent!”

“He was not treated as a witness should be – plenty of them have ‘proven’ one thing or another,” he said as the spike continued to twist and pull at him, “but until we know beyond the shadow of a doubt what the ‘truth’ is, I cannot accept any verdict you give at this moment, and I doubt neither could Edgeworth.”

--

Edgeworth hates the risk that they’re taking, and the way that Phoenix is sometimes flinching when he doesn’t raise an objection fast enough, or whenever it appears that de Killer has been caught in a lie. They both want the truth to come out, they both want this to end with Engarde in jail and without anything else for them to worry about beyond healing Phoenix so he wasn’t so weak as he was now, so he could regain his abilities and maybe face Franziska at his best.

Edgeworth pulls back his questions or attempts to make his case whenever he hears a tinge of an edge to de Killer’s voice, or Phoenix objects too loudly to his questions, but he soon doesn’t have any chance to make his own statements – Phoenix is pushing the killer more and more, no matter what threats he begins, and Edgeworth can see Mia Fey looking worried even as he glances at his friend.

Phoenix is in pain from whatever de Killer has done, and he’s pale and shaky…but he’s determined to do this. Even with Maya Fey’s life on the line, he wants the truth to come out.

“You’re beginning to sound like you’ve backed out of our deal,” de Killer said icily through the transceiver.

“Funny, I never asked for help, I was only told to do my job, and you’ve made that hard to finish,” Phoenix ground out, obviously angry, “I’m here representing someone that wants an acquittal, yet all of the ways you’ve gone through to ensure your client was not found out has only lead to here. So don’t start with me about backing off on deals or messing things up.” He takes in a breath as Edgeworth glared at him, trying to convey how worried he was with how things were going. He finally took in a breath and glanced at Phoenix, who swallowed back whatever else he was going to say before giving the barest of nods. Edgeworth finally said respectively, “I have no further questions for the witness.”

“But Mr. Edgeworth, you…” the Judge started before Edgeworth shook his head, leaning forward and saying simply, “The prosecution rests, Your Honor.”

“I expect to be called when the verdict comes in,” de Killer said, ending his call as Phoenix gripped the table, looking down and appearing both upset and like he was barely holding himself up. They both feel the despair right up until the doors burst open with a loud, familiar voice yelled out, “успокойся!” at the same time another, just as familiar voice let out a loud “OBJECTION!”

Standing in the doorway, a sight that probably would have sent fear into any lesser man’s eyes, was Salmone Hari and Franziska von Karma, both appearing regal in their own way – Salmone’s hand held out and the remains of a spell to get them into the court still dying on her fingers, while Franziska held the ratty coat that Gumshoe normally wore in a ball, still looking all the bit a D’Arcy or a von Karma as she strode in easily, taking the stand as she told them, “I have new evidence.”

“You must forgive me, but I doubt that will change things,” the Judge told her, the two looking at him as he said, “Mr. Edgeworth has failed to prove beyond a shadow of a doubt that what his last witness stated was not the truth about who is really guilty here. I will see the evidence, but unless they prove anything else about which of the two we have here – Andrews or Engarde – is the client of de Killer.”

She looked over at him before saying, “We’ll have to see. There are three pieces of evidence here…any could make the difference.”

The first was the gun that very likely had shot her and gotten him back in as a prosecutor was brought out, though it was only speculation that it was said gun and ballistics had yet to get to it. The next was a bellboy outfit that had Phoenix frowning as they brought it out – it had the gloves that Powers had seen, and was missing a button.

The final piece had Phoenix straightening as Franziska explained that de Killer had attempted to get the item before, resulting in Franks and his men having to put up a fight, three of them getting badly wounded but the video remaining in their custody.

Engarde doesn’t trust anyone…so he has collateral and a way to blackmail or get back at people.

“Your Honor! I have a request,” Phoenix says as the items are entered in but the Judge looks like he has no reason for them to be considered beyond their link to de Killer, “I would like to speak to de Killer again.”

“What? Why?”

“I have something to tell him. It’s important, and it will only take a moment of the court’s time. After that, you may declare the verdict.”

The Judge looked over at Edgeworth, who glanced at Engarde as the pieces fell into place. He could almost hear Mia Fey as she muttered the only two ways out of this.

We make Engarde wish for a Guilty verdict…right now, there is no way that can happen, even if he’s acting like his ‘spring breeze’ stupid self. The other way, the one that will be harder if we’re not careful with our evidence…we have to get de Killer to end his contract with Engarde…

He values his duty to his clients above all else, Phoenix thought, the focus tinged, as if he was thinking around something.

He also values the ‘trust’ between a client…he has ways around it – Edgeworth flinched a bit at the reminder of the pain that Phoenix was put through to prove de Killer’s abilities – but he also doesn’t have to meet face-to-face to do that…so why do it to a lawyer? Why not to his client?

Unless he meets them to really see if he can trust them…and if Engarde is good enough at hiding his “real self”, then that means even de Killer could have been mislead.

The bear and the spy camera, all set up…and a set time for it to start recording, and for de Killer to do his deed.

No one has any idea of what de Killer looks like…but the camera might have caught him. Can he risk that?

“You may show one piece of evidence to him then,” the Judge said, “and only one.”

“One is all I need.”

--

The spike is reacting badly, and for the first time since he placed it on the lawyer, de Killer is beginning to regret that. He had thought that maybe, the other one would have the ability to remain in place long enough for them to escape, but how far his mind has already decayed, combined with the powers that de Killer had only marginally witnessed, made a trade for the Shaman lineage impossible. He sighed as the transmitter beeped again, getting him to answer simply, “Have you come to a verdict yet? This is taking far longer than I expected.”

His guilt over bringing about the end to another like themselves, not to mention his wonder at meeting someone related to the Harpy herself, had meant he’d decided to leave Maya Fey alive and actually give her water. It was a break in the contract, but he had a feeling that something else had come up to break the contract anyway.

I should have gone with that blond fop of a lawyer…I doubt he’d be this much trouble to get an acquittal, and I probably would only have to threaten that brother of his. Not like killing off a star performer is hard either. Kidnapping is far more work. I doubt I’ll do this again.

Wright had been correct to say that he’d only seemed to add more troubles – shooting von Karma had lead to that other prosecutor appearing, and he’d played the whole thing like a fiddle. If von Karma had been there, Andrews would be in a cell by now.

“I have one piece of evidence to show you…only one, and some questions about it in general.”

“Very well,” he said, looking as the video he’d attempted to get earlier was shown, and the mention of the men he’d hurt brought up. “Yes, regrettable, but it was part of the deal with the client. I was to protect that tape from harm.” Not the oddest request that a de Killer would get – he didn’t doubt that the time of Renaissance Italy had been rife with interesting and strange requests, not to mention a few his grandmother had taken during her life – before adding, “I seemed to have failed in that regard, though.”

The job was full of bad turns. He almost wishes he hadn’t taken it, despite the fact that he would have missed the lawyer if he hadn’t making him really consider the pros and cons of it in hindsight.

“Do you know the contents of this tape?”

“I was sternly told by my client to not watch it,” he frowned at the question as he wondered about why that would be asked. Where was the lawyer going with this?

“Just so you know…you’re on this tape.”

He freezes. Electronics…that had been the bane of at least one de Killer, but they’d never been caught on tape, and if they had, it had never been in the act. He doesn’t doubt now that that is what the lawyer is leading towards.

Are you being funny?

Not at all…I’m running off what your client told me, and what I found.

“There was a video camera hidden at the scene, and it was recording when you went in to ‘deal’ with Mr. Corrida.” He saw the image of a large, expensive, stuffed bear, and a camera coming out of it’s eye with a timer – 8pm.

“Wh-what? Who…who planted that--?” Cameras found, “they spied on each other constantly”, the receipt for the bear and the testimony of the cashier…

“The only one who would have planted it in such a way, and with that timer, would be your ‘client’.” The lawyer didn’t sound smug, at least, simply matter-of-fact.

We were both played.

It went through quickly as he considered what Wright had pointed out. The client had given him a time and location after he’d decided the dope was doing something he’d regret later. He was trustworthy…

The image of hair being pushed back to reveal scars, the talk about people being parts of a sigil…”You can talk to my ‘true’ self now”

Anger bubbled up in him, and he cut the connection to the spike and Wright, the first sign that his contract with Engarde was done. “I had no idea. Mr. Wright…do you have an answer as to why my client would do such a thing?”

“Your client told me they didn’t believe anyone,” Wright said, “especially assassins…and that anyone can be blackmailed. Your ‘client’ didn’t trust you, and was willing to keep that as blackmail over you, for however long they could.” He doesn’t mention that it could also get into unsavory hands, hands like that of the task force, or worse, the Harpy and her men.

I’ve probably already caught her attention…I threatened her son, and I took part in shooting a high-level. She’s not going to let that slide. She’s bad enough to magi and others she finds who did nothing.

“I see that I’ve been deceived by a natural,” de Killer ground out, anger rising to a state that made him crush the transceiver he’d been using when it meant threatening Wright in the traditional way. He should have put a spike in that kid when he first met him, and worked on digging it out now, slowly as everyone watched what happened to clients that double-crossed him.

Everyone else played their part, so they were not put into such a state. This one…he wanted the attention and he wanted to have me mess with everyone around him, just for kicks.

“I have a question,” the prosecutor asked, his voice smooth and calm, “You told us something numerous times during your testimony – that you detest traitors.” I threatened your boy-toy as well, high-level, and don’t think I couldn’t tell you stopped the questioning when you thought he was in pain.

“Yes,” de Killer growled, hoping for at least something from the prosecutor. Maybe he shot the wrong one…next time, he’d aim for that gray-haired one.

“If the traitor was your own client…for the record, what would you do then?”

…I don’t think I’ll shoot you now. In fact…if the Harpy is around, I might even take the risk, since I see now what you were doing. But only this once.

High level or no, the prosecutor was going to be on Wright’s side, meaning there was a chance he could survive, and the de Killer family could get him later on, if they needed him. If not…well, they could watch to see what happened between a high-level and one like them who could make those connections, and who did so with both working together.

I wonder if that wouldn’t make something even more interesting than one like Wright at his full glory…

“That’s easy enough to answer,” he said, allowing his anger to creep into his normally neutral-sounding tone, “I would break the contract immediately, and then…” he smiled at the thought of dealing with that petty little brat and his fake idiocy, toying with him until he died, not making it a swift death at all, “that client would become my next target. For the honor of the de Killer name…we are as honorable as any lineage, and even if that target took an eternity to get…rest assured, I would follow that person to the ends of the earth to exact my punishment.” He left that part alone, though the coolness of his voice, which he knew would sound like a cat stalking prey, was enough for the imagination.

“I see,” the prosecutor said, sounding as deadly as de Killer did at that moment, “Then that’s all I needed to know.”

Maya Fey was waking up, bound nearby, as he said, “Mr. Wright…my contract is over with my client, and I seem to have a new task at hands. So I will return your precious item to you.”

“WHAT? I’M NOT AN ITEM!”

He hung up and crushed the transceiver, getting her to let out a startled yelp and fall quiet.  “I think I’ll let the lawyers toy with Engarde first. They’ll find you soon enough.” He stood up, “I owe them. We don’t go after those we owe, so know this, Maya Fey…your friend may have to face someone very dangerous soon. Be ready, with the weight of your whole clan behind you, for that confrontation.”

--

Pearl is tired when Mystic Mia leaves, even if Mystic Maya isn’t happy about something, but she’s happy to see that Mr. Nick and Mr. Eh-ji-werth are here, Mr. Eh-ji-werth telling them that Mystic Maya was on her way here with the police.

“She appears unhurt and was not dehydrated, at least,” he tells them, Pearl frowning at the word as he tells her, “That means that de Killer gave her water, so she isn’t going to feel ill if she has some food. Frank said that she’s pretty good, but shouldn’t have too much food too quickly...or if she does, to mostly have some soup or stews for right now.”

“You haven’t seen how much she puts away,” Mr. Nick joked quietly, though he looked very tired. She didn’t like it when he looked so bad, it reminded her of when Mr. Drake came to see him and they had been so upset and sad. She’s still glad that Mr. Nick can make a small joke, and was even happier that Mr. Eh-ji-werth was taking care of him. She wanted Mystic Maya to do that - she wanted Mr. Nick to always be at Kurain with them, and to get better and not sick like he had a few months ago, and to look more like the picture she’d found of him and Mystic Mia, when he was younger and looked really nervous in his blue suit that was all new.

She is about to move and hug him, tell him everything will be ok, when Mystic Maya comes in with Ms. von Karma and Mr. Franks, Ms. von Karma looking angry as Mystic Maya races up, Pearl reaching her first and hugging her tightly, Mr. Nick standing and smiling at them as Mr. Eh-ji-werth also stands, looking far from his confident self, and almost like he’s not sure what to say.

“Mr. Edgeworth!” Mystic Maya says, surprised, as Mr. Edgeworth gives her a small smile.

“Maya...I’m glad to see you’re alright.”

Mr. Nick is looking as bad as he always did when he had to take his medicine, but he’s not this time, and he barely manages a hug for Mystic Maya before he’s swaying and looking as bad as he had when Mystic Mia had left her and they’d brought him to Kurain right before he was declared to Mystic Maya. She briefly heard something in the back of her mind, a remembered memory from when Mystic Mia had been weak and it allowed her to recall a few things.

Pearls quickly slipped over to the trash can as Mystic Maya asked Mr. Edgeworth about what was going on, sounding upset but also happy to see him, and she peeked in before spotting the bag. In it was the Coldkiller X, but it had pills in it when she knew that was supposed to be liquid. She didn’t know why Mr. Nick had thrown it away, only that he had and she had it now, so he could feel better. The odd note was weird, and looked very vague, but she left it alone and instead headed over, waiting as Mr. Edgeworth told them, “I’m sure the Gatewater will be fine with putting out a spread for you, Maya.”

“Yes! Thank you!” Mystic Maya said happily as she jumped for joy, her stomach rumbling unhappily as Mr. Edgeworth told them, “I’ll go bring my car around. It won’t take long.”

Pearl quickly headed over as she asked, “Can Ms. Hari come too, if she’s still here? Please? Please?” Ms. Hari was a nice lady who sometimes said things in another language, and Marilyn Hari was also a great person too, even if she hadn’t been able to visit Pearl because she’d been stuck in that bed. She hoped she was getting better.

“I think she went to check on her sister,” Mr. Nick told her seriously as they headed out. She saw he was shaking a little, but he still was smiling, looking happy just to be with them, “but we’ll have to see if she’s still around.”

Pearl nodded at the thought, wondering when she could tell Mr. Nick about the pills so he could take the medicine and feel better. She didn’t want him to feel bad, and he kept looking like he was very sick, like when he’d been with them during the New Year’s and had been ill afterwards. She holds onto them as the pretty red car drives up, Mr. Edgeworth getting out to open the door for them, Mystic Maya sitting in the back while Mr. Nick goes to sit up-front.

Pearl doesn’t like that and gets into the front seat instead, Mr. Nick letting out a sigh as he goes and sits in the back with Mystic Maya. Mr. Edgeworth doesn’t comment as they go to the Gatewater and are ushered into the room with a big buffet, like the same one that they’d had during that big announcement that started everything, and Pearls jumps happily as she sees everything laid out, racing over with Mystic Maya following as Mr. Nick and Mr. Edgeworth come up behind them. Mr. Nick still looks ill, and Pearl slowly breaks away as Mystic Maya and Mr. Edgeworth get some food to tug on his sleeve. He looks over at her as she finally pulls out the small bottle. “I...Mystic Mia showed me where these were.”

He looks at them with an odd look in his face, one that she can’t figure out, and then looks over at her before he shakes his head.

“I don’t need those anymore, Pearls, but thank you.”

--

The spike is quiet but it’s still there, and he has an idea that Maya and Edgeworth are doing their best to not leave him alone. He doesn’t know why - they had won, yes, but the only thing he’d done was do his part as a defense attorney. Yes, he’d gotten Engarde to plead guilty, and they’d managed to get Maya out...but that spike was still there, meaning de Killer could use him to hurt anyone else. Edgeworth was here and no matter what he said, he couldn’t reconnect to Phoenix like that, he couldn’t think that it was a good idea! Even with the small bit that Edgeworth and he had been able to pull off in court, he knew it was only a matter of time before the bond became strong enough that Edgeworth would begin to have his feelings walled off again, to be unable to connect with anyone, and that would be Phoenix’s fault.

That’s what happened with her...he thinks, unhappy at how often he was thinking about Dollie after all these years. He knew that she was or would be dead soon - he hadn’t had a chance to go see her since Mia’s death, and he doubted Mia would have approved of him going to see her anyway. The two hated each other for some reason, and neither had told him why, beyond saying that it was ‘personal’.

But for Miles to think that it could help, that it might even be something he wants back, to use it like it’s not going to hurt him again…

Phoenix manages to sit through a few bites and some talk before he goes to head to the bathroom, his body shaking as he reaches the one he’d been in when Corrida had died and he’d been unable to feel it, let alone stop it. Maya’s kidnapping, Andrews nearly being convicted of murder and having to let everyone there know about her problem, von Karma getting shot (even when he’d been trying to keep his power in check, he could still feel her anger and hurt, and knew it was for him), that was all because he’d not felt Corrida die, because he was a lawyer who had the reputation of being able to turn around cases, because he was a null who managed, somehow, to befriend a lineage and a high-power level person.

He leans over the sink and lets out a breath, blinking as he sees drops of red going into the sink. He didn’t realize how bad things were until just now, with the feel of Corrida’s death, of Andrew’s determination, and everything else clouding his mind to what was happening to his body. He should’ve taken at least one of the pills that Pearls had gotten, but he couldn’t take it with that bottle, even if it was Pearls handing it to him. All he saw was Dollie on the stand, was Doug’s dead body when he returned, was his voice telling him to not trust Dollie and him not trusting him, not wanting to trust him, pushing him aside as there was a loud crack and—

His whole body is shaking now, and he feels as bad as he had when he’d first gotten off the pills, years ago after he’d learned they couldn’t stop him from doing such a harmful thing, from once more hurting someone he cared about and making them into a person who would kill and steal. I won’t…I can’t let him become like her, I can’t! Not when he just figured out how to live, not when he has so much potential, when he can change things and I…I’m…

His head is spinning as he tries to focus, to think straight, noting the blood on his hand from where he’d tried to clean off the slow drip of it coming out of his nose. It seems so dark against his hands, and he realizes that he doesn’t have the time to get away. He should’ve tried to get away right after the trial was done, should have gotten somewhere alone and where he wouldn’t be found. He starts forward, and blinks when he sees Edgeworth coming at him, and a sudden sense of déjà vu hits him right before he lands against something solid and the world goes black.

Chapter Text

Gatewater Hotel

7:45pm

Edgeworth is glad that Maya had kept the small child away, and he’s just as glad that Gumshoe arrived and was in good health. It gave him someone to contact the moment he’d gotten to the bathroom and found Phoenix in the state he was in, so they could get a room in order to try and stabilize Phoenix while Gumshoe tried hard to not panic.

He’s not so happy when Maya Fey, Franziska, Fressia, and Salmone Hari all but burst into the room just after he’s gotten Phoenix at least in the bed, or the fact that Maya goes white at the sight of the blood on his cravat and shirt. It had taken a lot out of him to shove as much Fire and Metal and anything else that might help, and the result had only stopped the nosebleed that Phoenix had. Whatever was scaring Phoenix too much to accept any of his help was effectively blocking all of Edgeworth’s attempts to get his friend to waken and to reconnect beyond the small bond they still had, and even then, the small bits of emotion he could feel from his unconscious friend seemed to revolve around both grief and self-hatred to a point that even Edgeworth was at a loss as to what had caused it, though he’d blame Drake Wright if he had a chance to prove anything.

“He’s alive, but he’s not awake,” he told her after getting himself a glass of warm water to drink, trying to keep himself from falling over after all he’d done. “I sent for Franks.”

“Why would you send for him and not a doctor?” Franziska demanded, but Fressia answered – she’d been aware of what Phoenix might be, and so she was better at answering the questions that, right now, Edgeworth had no time for. He’s hoping that Gumshoe had managed to go and get a change of clothing, or at least that someone was able to keep Pearl Fey occupied while he changes, and he’s at least in the other room when the little girl’s voice speaks up. “Mystic Maya, what’s wrong with Mr. Nick!?”

“He’s very ill,” a new voice, one he vaguely recalled from a year ago, speaks up softly, “and he’s very sad, Pearls. We’re going to work to make him better.”

“He…he needs his pills, doesn’t he? He said he didn’t, and I believed him, and…and…….” There was much soothing from the other side as Franziska walks in, looking at the unconscious form of Phoenix then back to Edgeworth, her eyes angry and sad and every other emotion that she normally reserved for when she was working hard to not be too affected by things. He had a guess, from what Gumshoe had told him, that most of the emotion came from realizing how bad Phoenix’s ‘illness’ was, as well as the added factor of seeing him when she’d read up on the results of Amalthea’s death and what happened to Lír Wright.

“If I’d known,” he starts, but she cuts him off with a sharp jerk of her hand.

“No one knew about this and no one is going to know about this,” she points out, “even if there is more than one person here, and one is a child.”

He’s unsurprised by her determination, but he is amazed at how annoyed she looks. “Franziska…”

“His father is certain he will die. I managed to read the report that the hospice doctor gave as to how Lír Wright died.” She pointed at Edgeworth with a determined look. “You are going to fix this, so that we can prove Drake Wright wrong. If we do that, maybe he’ll figure out something more productive to do besides drink himself to death.”

He didn’t comment on his own feelings towards Drake Wright – sober or no, the man would always be the one who set Phoenix down this path, and who was ultimately responsible for everything that was going on with Phoenix, with every fear and terror he’d had that had resulted in them having a year apart that only resulted in Edgeworth realizing how much damage he’d done, and with Phoenix accepting his death and  his decision to commit suicide( which was very likely, if the images of Dusky Bridge and icy water was anything to go by). Edgeworth had himself to blame for ever planting that idea in his head, and it was enough to make him almost wish Franziska had brought her whip.

That isn’t going to help me, he thought, stopping the painful emotions that were welling up in him, I need answers, and a way to get Phoenix to listen and accept my help. He trusts me in all things but this…I need to get through to him.

“What did Marilyn say?” he finally asked, getting Franziska to start and look at him curiously. “She’s the one who stopped my suicide. I know her pretty well, even if she only just woke from a coma.”

Franziska let out a huff, obviously annoyed by his answer and just as obviously upset over what little she knew about Marilyn. He didn’t mind that – if Salmone Hari told Franziska the truth about that, he doubted she’d want to work as a prosecutor anymore. What little she remembered of a favored nanny who was sent away had already made her more prone to treating everyone equally, especially nulls and high-powered or lineages, but to hear that a null was beaten into such a state by her family would have upset her beyond the pale. To hear that it was only due to Gumshoe, Pearl Fey, and her own fear of what she’d done that got her awake might make Franziska even more upset than she already was with the way things were going.

“She says that he’s dying,” Franziska told him after a long moment, “She’s upset with herself and doesn’t want him taking any of the drugs that Pearl Fey has, but is also sure he won’t take them.”

He frowns at that, looking at Phoenix. Curious, he shifts and thinks of what the bottle looks like before putting the image out, heading to Phoenix’s mind—

Chains and locks, dark red and almost black, surround an image he can barely make out, and everything, weak as it is, buckles in fear/terror/no and a wave of nausea and pain follows—

“Miles!”

“I’m alright,” he manages, coughing and taking in gulping breaths. What in the world was that?

“You are not, and if you try that again, I--!”

He shook his head, aware of a headache that was restarting, not because of her but because of the situation. “I was trying to figure something out. Even though he’s not conscious completely, some part of him is awake and aware. I tried to figure out why he wasn’t taking something that, by your accounts, he’s addicted to.”

“And?”

“And...something happened that seems to be blocking my access to it. I’m not sure how to unblock those either,” he let out a sigh as Franziska looked away, as if trying to figure out what else to say as well. She’s never been able to explain herself that well, and even when she does, she can often trip over words or say something that, to her, speaks volumes but to everyone else comes off as selfish or harsh.

“We need to find his father,” she finally grounds out, getting Edgeworth to glare at her before she adds, “Don’t be so rash. He was at least trying, when I saw him. Perhaps this will be a catalyst and he’ll remain sober.”

She doesn’t sound too certain, but he finally nods. Whatever else there is, he has to figure this out, or at least figure out what has gotten the odd person he saw, someone he knew…

“Mr. Edgeworth...I’m so grateful for your kindness…” Her arm looped around his casually as she gave him a warm smile that didn’t quite reach her eyes, “You’re not at all like how they portray you.”

“That’s very nice, Ms. Foster, but I have a trial to conduct,” he removed his arm, and noted the odd flash in her eyes, as if reassessing him. “I don’t want a murderer to go free.”

She looked away and sniffed. “I...no, I won’t want that either.”

She’d been smiling when she walked out of court, her former ‘lover’ dead on the stand from poisoning, and that same locket around her neck and--

“Franziska, send Maya in here,” he said quickly, looking back at her. “I have a very...odd request, and I think only she can do it.”

--

The group divided in odd pairs - Franziska and Marilyn went to find Drake Wright, Salmone and Pearl went to get changes of clothing and other things, and Gumshoe stayed to help Fressia with warding the room against any danger as Maya looked at Edgeworth, considering for a long moment.

“Mia doesn’t like you.”

“I know, but I think we can put that aside to save Phoenix, don’t you?”

She nodded, taking in a breath and seeming to focus inward before he watched her body change, growing more mature, and the eyes of Mia Fey now looked out at him, cold and annoyed, before they focused on Phoenix and grew worried.

“He knew that woman, didn’t he?”

The cold eyes locked back onto his, but he didn’t back down. “He knew Dahlia Hawthorne.”

“They dated, yes.”

“And?”

She glared at him and he returned it. Why the woman was so petty after nearly six years and a death was beyond him, and especially when Phoenix’s life hung in the balance. “I have reason to believe he’s...locked away...something that could let me help him. Right now he barely accepts any of the aid I do give. You either put aside your grievance with me and with that woman or you risk us losing Phoenix. Now, what is his connection to her, besides dating? What did she do to him?”

Mia shifted, looking away, as Fressia came in and looked over at her. The two were technically in the same business but also in a different one, and she looked over at Phoenix before looking back at Mia. “You took him on as an understudy almost four years ago, but he only recently started working cases. You could have had him take them, but instead you waited until he insisted on one...and you only got out because of what happened after that case.”

Mia’s glare turned murderous as Fressia pointed out, “You and I both speak to spirits, Mia Fey. The difference is that I don’t pull them out to find out about my mother’s fate when she abandoned you, or only used my powers when convenient. If you’d been in full control of your spiritual powers, you might have avoided your fate.”

“Are you and your siblings always so critical of people, or is that a new development? Last I went up against him, he was sure that anyone declared guilty was guilty.”

“And who’s fault was it that I had such a world view, or that my view could be so easily pointed that way?” he wanted to demand, but the heated argument had seemed to only make Phoenix more worried, or what part of him was awake was more withdrawn, and instead he said, calming down, “We should be working together. We can air our grievances later.” He glanced over at Mia, “He’s able to do things we can’t, Mia. He avoids strong confrontations or emotions or areas with recent deaths for a reason. And right now, he’s dying and something about Coldkiller X and that woman has him trapped. I need an answer so we might try to fix this.”

Mia blinked and frowned before saying, “I...don’t know enough about ‘traps’, but Maya and Pearl might...however, I can tell you that Phoenix was once under the control of Dahlia Hawthorne.”

The word makes him frown as she says, “Dahlia was a Pharmakon who was very good at specific sigils…controlling sigils that were woven into designs. The necklace that Fawles had was of her design, and despite how things went for that case, she got it back in time to poison…”

“To poison Diego Armando,” Edgeworth finished, “but somehow get out of a courthouse when--.”

“She got out by not having it on her person. She gave it to someone else.”

Edgeworth freezes as he realizes the timeline she’s laying out for him. He’d only recently arrived in the states and dealt with the Faraday issue when he took the Fawles case. He had believed that Fawles could be a murderer, because how couldn’t he be after what happened with the whole fiasco at Dusky Bridge? Then Dahlia Hawthorne, as Melissa Foster, had appeared as his perfect ‘witness’. He remembered getting pulled down over it, and his anger as well as his fear of what would happen if he lost the first case von Karma trusted him to do on his own, as well as what it could mean if von Karma sent him away when Phoenix had needed his support.

He hadn’t expected Fawles to commit suicide, and he hadn’t expected von Karma to count that case as a ‘win’ in such a disrespectful manner. Fawles had been guilty – of his own naïveté or simply of being an accomplice, Edgeworth would never be sure of. He only knows that those two cases were what pushed him to learn spells his powers had almost balked at, to work around spells that called for a connection to Earth so they could make shields, and had saved him and half a dozen other people because of his focus.

But to learn that Phoenix had been used by Dahlia Hawthorne…had been used, and if his suspicions were right, abused then thrown away…it would explain why he felt so afraid to maintain the connection, why he thought a connection might harm Edgeworth in some way, and even why, after he thought what his father had said was false, he still believed it.

“What happened?”

“They met on August 27th, in the courthouse. Eight months later, he was on trial for murder, and she was the main witness that Payne used. We figured out that she’d taken his Coldkiller X and put poison in it, and later used it to frame him for murder.” She let out a breath. “I didn’t keep many of the records about it, though, and overall the case was largely forgotten, or at least his connection to it was after the police began to look into what else Dahlia Hawthorne had done. He had been studying Art and Law, but switched to Law right after that.” She glanced at Edgeworth as he looked at Phoenix. “He said he was taking up law to ‘save someone’.”

“He did,” Edgeworth said, the statement enough to get Mia’s harshness to thaw a bit before she said, “I don’t know how you’ll get through to him, but I hope you do.”

--

Pearl and Salmone return as Maya lays out a general understanding of what he saw - Phoenix has locked up everything with ‘Psyche-Locks’, and the closer the locks are to black, the harder and more dangerous it will be to break them.

“Black locks are locks on the subconscious, and some are even locked by a chakra,” she told him seriously, “Unlocking them could cause serious damage.”

“He’s already to the point of dying,” Salmone pointed out as she came in with a change of clothing for Edgeworth - a simple t-shirt and some comfortable slacks to wear, and a similar set for Phoenix. He goes to change as Maya, blushing, moves to the door and keeps her eyes to the ground, saying, “I don’t even know how to break them when he’s unconscious.”

“Didn’t Mr. Edgeworth say he could speak to Mr. Nick?” Pearl asked as Salmone quickly got Phoenix into the shirt and then started to move to his pants as Maya let out a small squeak in protest. Salmone simply muttered, “Элемент неожиданности должен быть сохранен для новых отношений,” and continued on her task as Maya felt her face turn bright red. She instead focused on Pearl’s question as she said, “That’s right…maybe between Fressia and I, we can guide him through what he has to do.”

“I’ll help too! I’ll do anything I can, Mystic Maya!”

Edgeworth walked out as Salmone finished and gave Pearl a small smile, which changed his face from the serious one he always had to one that made him look more his age. He glanced at Maya as she returned his smile, happy to see some of the strain gone from his face. “Alright then…we need to figure out the locks first…” she considered before Fressia said from the doorway, “Do you think we could possibly perform a ceremony of memory?”

Pearl frowned as Maya considered. Such a thing meant that Mia would have to be there and put one of them into the memory of something that she and Phoenix shared, something that could get them the information to help them open up the locks. The lesser ones Maya was certain they could open on their own, or with as much work as they could. The problem was the darker locks that were around other memories, one that Mr. Edgeworth seemed unhappy to hear about.

“It could work, but I’m worried that there might be layers,” Maya pointed out as she considered it, “that means we’d have to do multiple ceremonies, or hope that doing one will allow enough of a connection to stabilize Nick.”

Edgeworth frowned as he looked back at Nick, the worry evident in his face. He looked like all he wanted to do was protect Nick, and Maya knew the feeling. She’d been experiencing it ever since Nick returned into her life and had shown how tired and sick her friend was, and now that Edgeworth is back, he can add whatever colored gem he wants to Nick’s pin.

Pearl looks almost daunted by the task as well as curious before Maya asks her softly, “Pearly…did Aunt Morgan teach you the Spirit Severing Technique?”

Pearl nods quickly. “Yes, and I learned on my own too, and I managed it with one of the students as well!” Fressia looks impressed as she says, “She’s quite the prodigy, Mystic Maya Fey. But if she’s doing the Severing, I take it you’ll channel Mia Fey for this time?”

Maya nods at the question as she adds, “I’m closer in age, and even if I’d been held for a few days, I haven’t been taxed like Pearl has. It’s best for now if I do it, at least at first.”

Fressia agrees as Salmone says, “I’ll go and get a list of what you might need, and give that sister of yours a call,” she told them before adding, “hopefully the two will stop their attempts to find that good-for-nothing father of his.”

Pearl looked angry as she said, “Mr. Drake is a good person! He’s working hard and he’s a nice man and you shouldn’t say bad things about him!” She then stopped and looked a bit sheepish as she added, “I…I heard.”

No one said anything as her face turned bright red before Fressia told Salmone, “I’ll go write up that list for you, and we’ll see how soon we can get everything together.”

Dulce - High-level and Lineage-only restaurant

March 24, 2018

7:45am

Lisbeth ends the call as it goes to voicemail again and glares down at the screen. Franziska wasn’t answering her calls now, and she was getting tired of the actions of her three children. She got that Miles needed space from the von Karmas, and she was prepared to give him space until he feels fine with returning to his work. She knows that Fressia is still upset over some belief that she was abused or something – Lisbeth didn’t know where that absurd idea came from either, but she blamed her on Miles’ sudden thought that he’d been abused as well. Now Franziska wasn’t answering any of her calls, when she’d gotten hurt by that horrible assassin person. She didn’t know much about the case or what happened, but she’s sure that the null had something to do with it - he probably was defending the client, and had finally allowed the assassin to shoot Franziska. Of course someone so petty as a null would let that happen without trying to do something about it or helping the police with finding the man, but as far as she can tell, Miles and Franziska have disappeared from the area.

She’s almost too mad to take her lunch as a familiar person sits down next to her, moving to adjust the long gloves she’d been wearing for a little over twenty years. The brown-haired woman smiled at Lisbeth, her dark blue eyes sharp as she said, “Having trouble with the children, Lisbeth?”

“Mikeyla!” Lisbeth said happily, grateful to see her old friend, “I haven’t seen you in ages. What are you doing here?”

“I was asked to come and deal with a problem, as well as lend my expertise to a minor...issue...that the police had. Sadly, that part is over - the man got away, mostly due to incompetence and this force having an overwhelming amount of policemen who are so low. I always prefer working with forces that at least have more normals or above on the force. That just leaves me having to deal with the other problem.”

Lisbeth frowned as she stirred some of the tea, the food forgotten and quickly taken away by one of the well-trained null waiters that didn’t even bother to make noise or ask anything. “What sort of problem, Mikeyla? Is it to do with that research your family has been doing?”

Mikeyla slowly nodded as a waiter came up at her motion and left again when she said, “Coffee, cream and two cubes of sugar, and the specials,” before she looked back to Lisbeth and said, “I’m trying to regain something, and I have a small window of opportunity in order to find it.”

Lisbeth leaned back, sipping her tea as she considered. “You’re searching for a ‘something’?”

“Yes,” she said as the coffee arrived and she tried it, approving of it before taking another sip, “I lost it before I realized it’s worth, but I haven’t been able to track it down until recently. A null took it from me.”

Lisbeth made a face as the specials appeared before them, and she glanced over the desserts as Mikeyla looked briefly at the information before putting it back down. They glanced to see the waiter coming in before they ordered then continued, “I am sorry to hear about that. My son - well, stepson actually - he has been acting so oddly since he befriended some null. The prosecutor of the county even said he took offense to a perfectly reasonable statement, though coupled with what that man was pushing on Miles after the issues with Manfred, I’m surprised he thought it was proper.”
Mikeyla hummed as she took another sip of her coffee. “I see the issue. I was told much the same thing, though it was a jest about a rather idiotic indiscretion I pursued when I was much younger.” She glanced at Lisbeth curiously, “How is he friends with this null? There aren’t any in the prosecutor’s office.”

“No, it’s that one with the defense attorney’s, who had a lineage Shaman as his boss. Do you know her family has declared him to be their lawyer and under their protection? After all the scandal because of the former Master’s pride, you’d think they’d steer clear of such things.”

Mikeyla nodded in agreement as their food came, saying simply, “Some always feel they can get better luck if they decided to show they’re ‘progressive’, Lisbeth.” She paused as she tasted some of the meal and continued to show her approval. “So you don’t know where that null might be?”

“No. Why, are you thinking of using him for a test? He’s uncommonly good with remembering things.” She recalled that he remembered Miles for a great deal, then frowned before she said, “He’s very rude, though…hasn’t been trained well, I don’t think. Why the Feys would want to deal with such a null is beyond me.”

Mikeyla hummed before asking, “Do you recall how he looks?”

“He’s dark-haired, spiked in the back, wears a lot of blue. His eyes are a dark blue color…oh, he’s a defense attorney…” she tried to recall what Miles called him. “Wright, I think his last name was.”

Mikeyla blinked at that, leaning forward. “Wright? And about as old as your Miles?”

“Yes. Why?”

“Oh…no reason, save that I knew a ‘Wright’ before, and he got away before I could give him the proper punishment. Do you have an idea of where he might be? I can put off my search to deal with this, at least.”

Lisbeth tapped her fork on the plate, the raspberry syrup around the remains of the cheesecake being messed up as she told Mikeyla, “My son is very misled about that particular null. He might take offense to being taken away from him.”

Mikeyla considered this before saying, “He left for a year, with a great deal of…well, drama.”

“That is a way to put it. Why?”

Mikeyla smiled a bit as she said, “If what I suspect is correct, Miles will give him up easily enough after I have a quick talk with him. That should solve everything.”

Lisbeth looked over at her and considered what that meant. Mikeyla had grown hard over the years, and changed into a person that Lisbeth knew might do things others would frown upon. Still, that hardness only ever was directed at those far below them, or others of their peers who either wouldn’t entertain the thought that information was needed on how nulls acted and what they were capable of, not to mention to show the differences between the various groups that most of the natural division that had come about in the modern era.

“You were right about Amelia, I’m sure you’re right about this,” Lisbeth said, taking out the information she’d gotten when Miles came to town and had checked into the Gatewater. “He’s probably here – they should give you his room number.”

Mikeyla gave her a warm smile and waved away the dessert that was coming. “I’m sure they will. Thank you, Lisbeth. If I stay for a little longer, we should have another talk. It’s been far too long.”

Lisbeth nodded, returning her smile. “You’re right. And if you can, maybe you can help me with Franziska…the girl is getting more and more willful after what happened with her father, I don’t know how to handle her.”

“I’ll do my best.”

Chapter Text

????

March 24, 2018

7:30am

Drake can say with some certainty that he acts the way he did, staying in one place over time, because he’s never had to worry about a certain someone sending any of her goons after him. He also never kidded himself to think that, beyond the anger he sometimes felt over their diminished bond, or the horrible nightmares that he knew came from her, that he really registered on her radar. After all, Mikeyla Goffe wanted healthy beings to experiment on, not ones that were drunk half the time and couldn’t even help anyone out while sober.

He admits that this is probably the bourbon talking, and frowns as he finds the bottle he’d gotten empty. It’s probably for the best - he’d gotten it and managed to convince his usual supplier to not tell a high-level, blue-haired prosecutor he knew, and feeling Mikeyla in town only made the need for alcohol and privacy that much more of a pull than usual. He’d probably have to apologize to Pearls later for this, but a good excuse was still an excuse.

You’re getting slow and idiotic in your old age, Drake thought bitterly to himself as he cast about to figure out if there was any way to get a new bottle this early in the morning or not. He’s pretty sure he can find somewhere that will trade for a bottle, or someone who might even do the same, and he slowly staggered to his feet as he felt something over the connection. Mikeyla was looking for him, and he frowned as the alcohol worked to close off some of the paths that she normally used. The cheap bourbon at least made him not care that she was looking for him, and he moved a bit away before a name reached his mind.

de Killer.

So that’s who she was ‘officially’ looking for. Well, he wished her luck - those bastards were as bad as she was in how they acted towards others, and that man had used Phoenix to try to get his client out of jail.

Interest comes over the bond, but he ignores it in favor of finding a place to get some alcohol. Phoenix is probably dead by now, and he’s nowhere near drunk enough to deal with the rest of the day either. Not to mention those bastards who were with him probably wouldn’t even left Drake to the funeral. Well, not that he’d want to be at that funeral either. Burying his father had been hard enough - burying Phoenix…

There was a reason that the thought of Pearls and that whip Franziska von Karma wielded wasn’t stopping his drinking or search for drink now. He was generally ignoring anything that Mikeyla, at this proximity, might have to think at him about his habits or whatever else she wanted to believe. She hadn’t been this close in years, and it was bugging him that she kept trying to use what little connection they had to get his attention, as if to find out something or tell him something he already knew.

He stumbles and almost falls at a sudden, almost demanding command for him to tell her where Phoenix was making him shake his head, his powers reacting and pushing her back so quickly that he doesn’t have a chance to stop them before there’s a blockage where she’d been using, the link so clogged that he can’t see anything beyond it, and he takes in a deep, frightened breath. She hadn’t been this interested in Phoenix since…

A new wave of panic did a wonderful job of washing away the rest of the bourbon’s effects and Drake was left wishing that woman hadn’t been so insistent on learning where Phoenix was, or even where his body was. It only served to make him try to think about where they’d go or even wonder if they’d take his call.

He goes on instinct, heading to the Gatewater Hotel. It’s one of the few places that were open to nulls that had a lot of money as well as all the high-levels, and their security is tight. He’s at least able to get into the lobby before someone stops him, the security guard asking, “Sir, where are you going?”

Drake stopped, shifting as he said, “I...I’m looking for my, my son, he…” Drake isn’t certain about this guard, about how much he can trust him with who his son is, not when she was looking for him, and he says, “He was here...last night, with--”

The crack of a whip stops them both before he sees Franziska von Karma, looking at him with either annoyance or confusion before saying, “He’s with me. I’ve been trying to get hold of you for some time. Where have you been?”

“I...that is…”

She let her whip fly, nearly hitting him. “Enough. Come on. Honestly…” she muttered in German as they walked into the elevator, Franziska waiting until they were heading up before she said, “You were drunk. You still stink of it.”

“My son died, I’m allowed to drown myself in my own way.”

She looked ready to whip him again before saying, “He’s not dead. My brother is keeping him alive, for all the good it’s doing. Your foolish fool of a son is not accepting any help.”

He frowns at that before he realizes what’s going on and lets out a groan. “It’s because of your foolish brother that we’re in this mess to begin with! What the hell is he trying to do?”

“He’s trying to save your son.”

“He’s going to get him killed. He should’ve kept his damned bratty nose out of our business and let Nick die.”

The slap, if anything, clears his head more than the threats from Mikeyla did, and he blinks as Franziska tells him, her voice deadly despite her youth. “I will allow that once for your anger and grief, but if you say such a thing to Miles Edgeworth or anyone else, so help me I will not be responsible for what we do to you! Do you not even care about your own son?”

He let out a breath and looked at her, wishing he could explain it. How the hell do you explain what you know, instinctively? How do you draw up that concept?

“We...our minds connect to people we...we think we care for, and that caring is returned. S-she...I was here because his mother is looking for him.”

“And?”

“And his mother is the damned Harpy, ok, because I connected with her. I made her that. THATis why I told him, I told him again and again, to never do such a thing! How long before that link hurts your brother to the point he becomes like the one I hurt in my selfishness? How long before you decide to hunt us down too because of all that pain it gives them? The only people who can hold that link is maybe other nulls, or other ones like us, but anyone with magic...this thing your brother is trying to protect, it’s going to drive him insane.”

Franziska is quiet, her eyes wide as she looks at him, and it’s only the soft ‘ding’ of the opening elevator doors that gets her to move, grabbing him and pulling him down the hall before he manages to pull away. “What are you doing?”

“You’re not taking me to him? Are you insane?”

“No, I’m quite sane, no matter that my parents are not,” she said, her arms crossed, “Why are you so determined to let your own son die?”

“I’m determined he at least doesn’t pass on this curse,” Drake argued back, “but your brother seems determined to be in constant pain and have some hold over Nick, and you didn’t listen to me or you don’t know half of what that thing can do.”

She starts to speak, then stops and looks at him curiously. “If you know...she knows?”

He nods, glad she’s at least getting it as Franziska curses in German and English. “I need you to come with me then.”

“What part of--.”

“She’ll know anyway,” she told him and grabbed his wrist again, pulling him to a room and quickly shoving him in, “but we might be able to get time to distract her.”

He probably should protest that, but facing that tall, huge detective that was almost always around and who’d thrown him out during the brat’s trial, not to mention the brat himself glaring him down the moment he saw him, he instead blinked and frowned. He’d never get those that had magic, and considering how much effort they were putting into trying to save Phoenix from a fate that would befall him, at least not until Pearls wandered out and gasped, looking almost afraid for him as she said, “Mr. Drake!”

Drake let out a sigh and gave her a small smile. “Hey Pearls.”

“Y-you’re here to help Mr. Nick, aren’t you?” she asked, looking both worried but also happy. If anything, in the sea of obvious annoyance at his presence, Pearls was just a steady, warm glow that at least believed in him, or in whatever he decided to do.

But can I let him be hurt like that? Can I really let them just...torture him? What the brat wants to do is worse than what Mikeyla would ask for - he wants to prolong the torment, prolong their link to the point where one or both will go insane from it.

Edgeworth glared at him, all the more like his dad, and finally said, “Why is he here?”

“Because we need to get Phoenix away from here,” Drake found himself saying, upset over everything but knowing that he had to save Phoenix from Mikeyla. At least whatever the brat was doing would be doomed to failure, and then Drake could mourn his son and fully fall into the bottles he’d been climbing out of for years. “Some people are coming who...have an idea about what we are, and who enjoy taking us apart to see how we tick.” He glances at Edgeworth, hoping that at least this idiot will listen to him. “My...Phoenix’s…,” he can’t quite say it, but instead he looks up at Edgeworth before saying, “I want the illusion that he’s buried under a gravestone. If you don’t move him somewhere safe…”

The woman who had been with Phoenix for a while, Maya, shifted from where she stood near Pearls, who looked worried. Edgeworth seemed to consider him for only a moment before he said, “I expect you to apologize to Phoenix when he’s better, for having such little faith in his ability to heal.”

Drake frowned at him, wondering what world this kid was living in. “I know how our powers work, brat. I know our limitations, and I know what I’m talking about. You’re not going to change that, even if you manage to do...whatever it is...you’re going to do.”

Pearl looked upset over all that was happening as Maya said, “We can discuss it here…Pearls, do you want to watch over Nick with Mr. Drake?”

Drake is almost grateful to the lineage for her suggestion, and he follows Pearls into the next room, Edgeworth continuing to glare at him as they leave and the voices grow low as they talk without the two in the room. Pearls went to sit near the bed, still looking very worried, as Drake looked over at his son and slowly moved towards him, finally ending up kneeling besides him, the position too familiar to not make Drake feel his eyes water.

He’d seen his father this pale, this thing and wasted away, and the usual, almost warm feeling that Phoenix always had was gone. His father had always said that Drake got the odd bits of water that made up his power from his mother, who had taught him to think of his power in rivers and channels, water and earth. Lír’s own powers were not that strong, but he could use magic as well, and had been the one that had explained what he could about their abilities, as well as how painful the bond could be if he used his magic with it, something that had made Amalthea worried and more prone to teaching Drake on their own, instead of when his father was around.

Seeing his father’s death, how slow it had been, and now seeing the same thing going on with Phoenix, it only makes him want to take his son away from all this and bury him somewhere private. At least then, he wouldn’t have to bother with all these formalities or whatever they were trying to do, and instead could allow Phoenix some peace. He doubted he wouldn’t be far from his own grave after this event, and maybe Mikeyla could take him and just accept defeat in this matter.

“Mr. Drake?” Pearls’ voice brings him back to the present enough to look over at her a bit, finding himself holding Phoenix’s hand and wishing he could use his own powers to heal him. The problem was that he’d tried that once, and it had only caused Phoenix pain and had made him more prone to trying to figure out his powers on his own. It had only added to the gulf between them, and was something that Drake regretted, at moments like this and in his own moments of sobriety.

“Yeah, Pearls?”

“Is Mr. Nick really going to die?”

He wanted to lie, and tell her that the brat and her…aunt? He’s not sure how that family works…will save Phoenix at the last moment. He wants to stay that he knows that Phoenix will survive, but…

“I saw my father die this way,” he hears himself say, not wanting to spare a girl who had only been kept from modern technology and transportation, but who could cut off a spirit’s ties with someone without any pressure, who knew what she was going to be even at such a young age, from lies and deceit. He’d never lied to her before…he saw no reason to do so now. “Edgeworth leaving as he did meant that some part of Phoenix is falling down a long, dark hole.” He remembers how his father described it, before he’d become too far gone to even remember his own name or that he had a son. “He might remember parts of his life, or bits that informed who he was, but…” he puts his head against his son’s hand, feeling tears streaming down his cheeks and not at all ashamed of the deep feelings he’s showing in front of the girl. She’d lost her mother to the courts, and he was losing his son to the same thing that his father had done. At least with Lír and Amalthea, they’d been equals in sharing the pain and odd mix of powers. Edgeworth was a high-power, as close to Mikeyla as Phoenix could get. Drake’s love had doomed her to a life of pain and madness – he hated to see what Phoenix’s own emotions would do.

“Can’t you save him?”

“Our powers are fire and water, Pearls,” he tells her truthfully, hating how watery his voice sounds, how resigned and saddened, and how it reminds him for when he’d tried to get his father to live for them, for Phoenix and Mikeyla and Drake together, before his father simply gave up and died, before Mikeyla had renamed herself the Harpy after trying to kill Phoenix and leaving the way she had. “I can’t help him.”

“Mr. Edgeworth thinks he can…do you think he can?” she asked finally, apparently hoping that his knowledge of their limits, abilities, and of the things she didn’t know about would give her the best idea of what could come of all of this.

“I think he’s only going to give Phoenix pain,” he told her, “and that to do so is just making him suffer more. I…I tried to keep my father here, when he suffered as Phoenix did.” He tightens his grip on his son’s hand, hoping for a response, and not surprised where there is not – no warmth, no attempt to fight back, nothing. He knew in January his son should be dead, and was angered and saddened that he’d pushed himself to last until March. Now, just feeling his son fading, falling—

No…there was something keeping him in the realm of the living, and Drake frowned as he slowly, cautiously explored it. Phoenix didn’t open up to people often, and hardly ever allowed his real feelings on the matter to be known. The last attempt had left them at odds for decades, and Phoenix unwilling to go to physicians because he was afraid of what his power could do (Drake understood, the feeling of  something so foreign in his body often wanted to make him flood the area they looked at, to avoid them looking again).  He frowns as he follows the feeling back to what looks like a spike stuck into something like a tundra or something similar, as unyielding as the terrain it was in, and Drake felt himself grow serious as he asks Pearl, “What is Edgeworth planning on doing?”

She looks surprised at his question before she asks, “Do…can you know that?”

“I can. What is he planning?”

“Mr. Edgeworth wants to break some locks in Mr. Nick’s mind. Why?”

Drake rests back as he considers before saying, “I have a thought is all. Please…don’t panic, and don’t mention this to the others.”

“Why not?” she asked, curious and worried as she shifted in her place, “Mr. Nick said he didn’t need something and he got really sick, I don’t want that again.”

He let out a sigh and gave her a small smile, leaning back on the balls of his feet and said, “It won’t be like that, Pearls. There’s something stuck in Nick’s mind.” Drake slowly examined it, noting the pain it was causing Phoenix, as well as how Phoenix’s state of mind was. The whole thing was like a super-volcano waiting to go off, and the brat wanted to wade into that problem like he could deal with it. His father had always said that their powers seemed to work more than the others – his own had often overwhelmed his father’s Air or Water attempts, though Lír had never really been gifted in that area.

“Something in his mind?”

He slowly nodded as he came back to himself. “It’s like something holding him in. Taking it out will cause Nick…” Drake paused as he thought. Taking out the spike might, at least, allow Phoenix to slide into death –right now, that and only some attempts at giving him a reason to live was what seemed to be their focus. But Phoenix’s mind held a lot of dams and ways to stop them from continuing onward, as far as Drake could see, and the spike was all that was really keeping Phoenix in. Whoever or whatever had put it there had put such a hold on him remaining in life that it meant everything else could and would die around it, but Phoenix’s body would live on. He wondered if that was de Killer’s doing, and if that was why Mikeyla was after Phoenix.

He pushed the thought away, back to the dam he’d made to keep Mikeyla out when her attempts to find Phoenix had pulled him into sobriety and made him actively keep her out of his head. She never focused enough to look for him, and the small attempt had scared him enough to come here. Now, seeing what he did, he wondered.

“Mr. Drake?”

“I don’t know what it is, Pearls,” he told her truthfully, “I just know that taking it out is key, but I can’t do it without hurting Phoenix.”

A somewhat angry feeling got Drake to look over at the brat, who’d appeared as they’d been talking and Drake glared at the gray-eyed boy who had decided to do his good deed by befriending Phoenix and thinking he knew what was best for him. He never got high-levels, and he doubted he’d ever really befriend or even like the kid that had so often thrown himself and his father into Drake’s path in a misguided attempt to ‘save’ Phoenix when they were kids. At least his Dad had waited to figure things out before judging Drake, and for all that Drake had complained to the brat when he was drunk, he had been upset when Gregory Edgeworth had died. The man was a good attorney and one who, after learning a bit more about Drake, at least allowed that his son was more worried about bullies and how badly Drake handled things than really acting on taking Phoenix away from Drake. The guy, and Franziska in her own way, had done a lot to at least make him think that high-levels were not the insane, power-hungry bastards that had killed his mother and doomed his father to a slow death. The brat seemed determined to undo all the goodwill his father had created.

“Yes, contrary to whatever fiction you have in your head, I don’t actively seek out ways to hurt my son,” Drake growled out, upset that the brat made him act like this when Pearl was looking so upset and hurt by their antagonism. He knew that Phoenix would hate it too, and despite all the pain that the brat would cause himself and Phoenix, he was trying to do what he thought was right.

He’s trying to save Phoenix’s life, even if it can’t really be saved. He let out a breath. “You got a good place to take him?”

“We do,” Edgeworth said, apparently settling on a safe topic that wasn’t about to get Pearls upset. “What are you going to do?”

Drake snorted, surprised he’d been asked that. “There’s a good amount of liquor here. Just don’t use the same tab you did to get here, or use the Fey one, and she’ll go on after having a ‘talk’ with me.”

If anything, that got Pearls to look worried and Edgeworth to both glare and somehow look upset with what he said.

“I thought Franziska warned you about that.”

Drake shrugged. “She’s going with you, or back to Germany, or wherever she wants. I don’t really count in the grand scheme of things. Besides, it’s been a while since Mikeyla and I talked about anything.” He’s a bit amazed he can say her name without the anger and bitterness of the past twenty-plus years coming up. Drake supposes that’s just part of what makes them such failures, and why he knows that this isn’t going to work and will leave Edgeworth bitter but sane.

Pearls races over to hit his leg as hard as she can, which gets him to wince as she says, “You can’t do it! I…I’ll stay here, and talk to that lady myself!”

He lets out a sigh, wondering if Phoenix knows how much like Pearls he’d been when he was around that age – determined and ready to face the world. If he’d been born with at least some magic, Mikeyla might have stayed around, or at least not done what she had to so ruin their family.

“I have to stay, and you have to go, Pearls.” He knelt down as she looked ready to hit him again. “I know how to talk to the lady we’re talking about, and you don’t. You know how to take care of Mystic Maya, though…I know you learned that much, because you want to care for her, and make sure that everything goes well, don’t you?”

She looks surprised and shifts, as if unsure what to say. “I-I do, but…”

“But nothing, Pearls. You go take care of Mystic Maya, and…” he let out a breath, feeling himself choke up again. He didn’t want this to happen, but the brat had done this, and was now acting like he could fix it, and even if he could, what was the point? He’d end up just like Mikeyla, and only break Phoenix’s heart again, but that time, he’d just use that broken heart for his own end. Drake couldn’t stop it either – he was powerless against Mikeyla when she’d hurt Phoenix, and he was just as powerless to help him now, not without facing down a lineage and at least two high-powers. He couldn’t hurt Pearls either by doing what needed to be done either.

As usual, you’re a fucking coward, Drake thought to himself before he finally took Pearls’ hands, saying, “Pearls…I need you to promise you’ll take care of Nick for me. No matter what happens, or how bad things get, I trust you to do the right thing, ok?”

She blinked, looking to Phoenix then back to him. “Mr. Drake? You’re not coming with us?”

“No Pearls. I can’t go near Nick right now…something bad might happen. But I trust you to take care of him, ok? No matter what…no matter what happens, you make sure he’s ok, that he isn’t…that he…” Drake feels himself choke on the words. He can’t say how Lír was in his final days, when his body looked like Phoenix’s and his mind was so far gone it was painful to see. He can’t say that it’ll get worse, that Phoenix will get worse. He can’t tell that one truth to this little girl.

“Mr. Drake?”

“Take care of him, Pearls. Please.”

She seemed to go quiet, and look older then her eight years, before finally nodding. “I promise, Mr. Drake.”

I need a drink. Tell me there is hard liquor in that mini-fridge I saw, and that there’ll be enough time for me to drink all of it. “Thanks. I’ll return the favor when I can, Pearls. Promise.”

--

By the time Mikeyla walks in with someone beside her, possibly a cousin or some other relation, Drake is far too gone to really be pushed back into sobriety, at least right now. He doubts the kid smacking him around before Mikeyla says, “Enough, Theron. You have someone you’re tracking down, and hitting that drunkard isn’t going to do anything to help.”

“He…”
“He won’t know. Even drunk, he’s far too smart for that. Go figure out where they went, and get them.”

The boy drops him and manages to level a kick at him as he groans and sits up, looking over at his wife. Phoenix had gotten her eyes, but apparently all the rest was all Drake’s, and he was grateful for that, in some cases, as much as it made Phoenix sound like some hero in his own story.

Mikeyla goes over to one part of the room, and he watches as she pours out a glass of water and then the rest of the alcohol left in the room. “I know he’s not dead. Not yet. I know enough about de Killer to know he put something into Phoenix that will leave him alive.”

He’s quiet as she easily balances the glasses and moves a chair over to sit in front of him, a bit higher up, and offers him the glass of water. He blinks but takes it, frowning at her.

“You look confused, Drake. Not that I haven’t become used to that look on your face, since I first talked to you.”

He drank the water and muttered, “You know why.”

“Of course I do. I am well aware of how things played out on your end, and on Phoenix’s. Father was very good at keeping me informed.” She drank some of the alcohol and finally said, “I need to get him, Drake. Before he dies on us.”

Drake snorted. “Sorry, you’re gonna have to wait for me to kick that bucket before you can get anything.”

She slapped him, and he let out a small, quiet chuckle. “That’s more like it.”

“Please, as if I ever hit you,” she told him, taking another drink as the sound of the bedroom being torn apart grew louder, “or was that the reason you weren’t so surprised I left?”

“You tried to kill Nick. I’m surprised you didn’t stay to get the job done.”

Mikeyla let out a sigh and took another drink. “A son who’s a null? I couldn’t live with the idea. And after all that was going on with your father, I thought perhaps the next one would at least start something. I wasn’t looking for something like you or Nick, I thought about something else entirely.”

“And then Nick burned you, and you left.”

Mikeyla shrugged as she sat back a bit. “My life had been a lie, and no amount of healing has made them any less scarred. I had to lie about what caused those marks, and finally gave up with lying and simply took to wearing these,” she showed her gloves. “You sank into a bottle you’d been thinking about going into since I met you. Don’t deny that’s not true.”

He drank more of the water. “Wasn’t gonna. Just pointing out, I was an idiot for thinking it was that you liked me.”

Mikeyla looks at him with a long stare, as if trying to figure him out, and finally says, “Fine, then tell me about this...prosecutor...that’s been around Phoenix.”

“I don’t know him that well. He’s a brat - his dad was ok, but his dad’s dead. Got shot.”

“I heard,” she sounded both annoyed and saddened. “Contrary to what you believe, Drake, we don’t all side with the murderous ones of our ilk.”

“No, no, you just let them continue what they’re doing for another twenty years before someone stops them, or you call it ‘raising the kids right’. The brat thinks he can save Nick,” he finds himself saying, but he doesn’t care right now - they went somewhere, he doesn’t know where, and the brat let him enough liquor to destroy himself. He thinks he’ll do that, or he should’ve done that, before Mikeyla came in.

“The ‘brat’ sounds like an idiot,” she mutters, taking a drink and saying to the kid as he comes in, “Go ahead, Theron.”

“But…”

“I’m perfectly safe and fine,” she argues with him, the kid about Phoenix’s age or a bit younger, and looking far too like Mikeyla’s brother, who’d roughed him up more than once during their ‘courtship’. “Go, Theron. The longer you wait, the further ahead they’ll be.”

Theron manages to not kick Drake on his way out, but it seems likely that’s because he had to go around Mikeyla’s chair, and she tells him, “Theron is my nephew. He’s also only just learning the fine art of bringing in people for questions. Sadly, he’s about as subtle as I was at his age.”

He doesn’t point out said ‘unsubtle’ event lead to his mother’s old group being taken away and no one seeing them again, and to rumors of the ‘harpy’ and her group kidnapping people.

“So...now what?”

“I left a long while ago, Drake. I learned a lot over the years. Right now, I want to know what happened to our son that left him with a record.”

He blinked at that. “You want to know about that bitch? Why?”

“For one, she killed everyone else she had wrapped around her finger, but Phoenix survived. I argued that he needed to be left and another to be found to examine about healing and poisons.”

Drake put the glass down, instead of throwing it at her. “How nice of you.”

“The other reason is that she’s related to the ones who agreed to place him under their protection. He’s declared to her family.”

Drake looked at her with a frown. “He’s declared to the Feys, though, and her last name was Hawthorne or something.”

“Her mother went with someone like those my brother and mother wanted me to go with. The result was Dahlia, who didn’t even have enough power to be considered a lineage. Her second result, with a man of unknown power, was Pearl, who is quite strong in her lineage power, though she can only vaguely be considered the type of Shaman that would rule Kurain.” She leaned back as she added, “Dahlia acts out selfishly, and in some cases impulsively. She’s also scheduled to die soon.”

“Good.” He hates what that woman did to Phoenix, though he knows only the vague details, but he also knows that much of Phoenix’s dislike of people who lie and any sort of thing involving poison comes from that woman. He’s not afraid of water, or of anything else, but he’s afraid of taking favors without knowing what they are, and he hates being lied to.

Mikeyla is quiet and finally says, “I suppose so. What did she do to him?”

He frowns at her and finally says, “I don’t know the whole thing. I know that she met him after poisoning some other guy who was talking to her about stuff and who was idiot enough to leave out an open glass for her to put the poison in. I know he held onto it, because of some sigil or something she put on it. I know someone who tried to warn him got himself killed, and the bitch set Phoenix up for it. Beyond that...nothing else. We weren’t really talking then.”

Mikeyla considers for a long moment before nodding and putting the alcohol into Drake’s hand. “If I don’t find Phoenix, then I’ll have to go back to hunting de Killer the old-fashioned way.” She rubbed along her gloved hands and then shrugged. “I was an idiot, back then. I did something I shouldn’t have, but at least now, I know how to do things right.”

“Taking Phoenix away isn’t ‘right’,” he said, pausing in his move to drink the leftover alcohol. “He’s got a job, and people willing to go against you and everyone else you have.”

She’s quiet and looks over at him, before he feels a gentle, questioning probe before nodding. “I see. That doesn’t change what I need him for, Drake, or the fact that, whoever might be with him, I do still need to find him before they see if the ‘cure’ works or not.”

--

Mikeyla stepped out into the hallway and let out a sigh as she saw Theron waiting for her. “What did I say?”

“That’s Uncle Drake?”

Another sigh as she nods. “It is. Are you done looking at him like he’s such a disappointment? I told you what to expect.”
“I met Cousin Nick, I didn’t expect Uncle Drake to be...well, that. None of the others were.”

She shook her head at how innocent he’d sounded, despite the hard exterior he’d put on and the abuse he’d leveled at Drake. Theron was young still, and so he allowed himself violence when he thought it was necessary, but also was at least open to other lineages. He was even handsome, with his lighter gray eyes and strawberry blond hair that set off against his tanned skin that came from hours outside working, instead of the false-tan that many of his peers had and scoffed at him for avoiding. “None of the others have been outside of the magi. Are you done being so amazed, or have you found my wayward son already?”

Theron gave her a huge grin. “I know a few places, and sent some of the others to check discreetly. We’ll find him before tomorrow, Aunt Mikeyla.”

She nods to dismiss him and considers calling someone to take care of Drake. Their marriage had been one that was...odd, strained, and had ended badly on both of their sides. She should have taken Phoenix with her, or at least taken them both and convinced them it was for their own safety. Finding the troupe that Amalthea had belonged to had at least convinced her father and the others that there was promise in what she was studying. It allowed her brother to at least work out his frustrations on the ones they got, instead of going after Drake or Phoenix, and in some ways she was glad that they could find so many of that kind without bothering the two. Time away from them had left her longing for the wisdom to test Phoenix in a way that hadn’t left such scars or bitterness, and that would have at least given her ways around the more violent methods that her brother and father sometimes resorted to, which had left her even more determined to keep her son and husband to herself, for her own study when it was warranted.

That part she never got...she never told them what Phoenix did, said that Drake had done it, when she knew he was like a changing river or landscape, both situated and moving. That he drowned himself like this only said that her timing had been...bad.

A few more years, and all this unpleasantness might have been behind us.

She’d considered her son worthless for not having power. She’d tried to drown him so maybe, a brother or sister would reignite the dead branch that had once been a promising high-level clan. Instead, she’d found some new way of looking at nulls, one that meant her brother and his son were all for tracking them down and testing them so they could be ‘safe’. De Killer and that group had been a bonus, one she wasn’t going to let out of her grip this time.

Though time is running out…I suppose I’ll have to take the door prize, then.

Dahlia Hawthorne, daughter of the Fey clan’s Morgan Fey, had hurt her son. She’d used him to cover up her crimes and had nearly killed him with poison and hatred. Whatever else, her son had always been more attuned towards feelings than anyone else, just as Drake, in some cases, had been. She wondered if that had been a prompt to his drinking, and once more wished she’d not reacted the way she had, all those years ago. It would have kept Phoenix safe, even if he was tested, and it would have kept Drake’s drinking under control. It was only now that she had enough influence in her family to go after the ones who’d so ruined her chances, and with enough of her nieces and nephews and others on her side to do what was needed.

I will make the Fey clan pay for birthing such a child, and then only now taking on my son as some sort of consolation prize for their usage of him. If he survives this, even if I don’t get de Killer, I may yet get someone who understands what it’s like to have power and to be attached to one like my Drake.

Drake’s power was Water and Earth, and was grounded, but she was a Shaman who could divine the future. Her Sight had only shown her that Phoenix would never show signs of magic as she knew it…her new Sight of him was so uncertain that it angered her. The only other time this had happened was when he’d been dating that girl.

I think Dahlia Hawthorne has lived long enough, and so have the others that used him. Whatever fate my son has, it’s with either me, or someone who will actually make him happy.

Chapter Text

Borscht Bowl Club - Hidden Room

March 24, 2018

Miles Edgeworth decided that he was never going to ask Salmone Hari about possibly hiding anything again, if only because he has a feeling it will remain very well hidden. He’s grateful that Franziska left for Germany and that, so far, the plan has worked. Fressia and Gumshoe were apparently very impressed with the warding as well, Salmone not talking about it and instead going to ‘run her business’ as he, Fressia, and the two Feys remained behind to work with her on the ceremony of memory they wanted to hold. From what little he knew, he would be taking Mia’s place in the memory, and the magatama would be used to slowly unlock the various locks that were in place.

Franks is also working on keeping others from finding them, though he’s also considering heading to Interpol with Franziska. Not that Edgeworth minds - the two seem to be a good team, and he’s happy that Franziska has someone she can trust and who will watch over her. Gumshoe is out and probably begging for his job back, leaving only these few to work at saving Phoenix.

He’s fine with it, even though he’s still upset over what little Drake Wright told them. The man wasn’t going to fight for his own son, and Edgeworth’s already low opinion of him wasn’t about to raise up with the way the man acted.

He stops the thought and instead focuses on Phoenix, on trying to reach him as he sees the chains and locks around him, enough of them a dark black color to make him worry and realize how bad things will get as they go forward with this.

“Everyone’s ready,” Mia’s voice calls him back as he looks over at her and she moves to sit to the other side of Phoenix. For as long as she can, she’ll provide some of the memories, and Fressia will direct them, but the fact that Phoenix’s powers are mental means that this leaves a high risk to both him and Edgeworth.

Edgeworth doesn’t care. He caused this - he’s going to fix it.

District Courtroom

April 11, 2014

He’s nervous about what’s going to happen, and some part of him knows that the nervousness is part of what Mia felt, as well as his own nervousness at what could happen during this trial. It was the first of a long line of connecting memories, and he couldn’t be sure if the connection back to the ‘present’ would last.

He glared at Grossberg for his assumption that this was his first trial, thought it was the first time that he was working on the other side, even if he didn’t have any evidence or anything to really work with beyond what was given to him. Even if he was stepping into the role that Mia Fey had taken, he looked like he had back then, a year after that first fateful trial. He wished he’d had Mia’s ability to remain outside of the court for a year, but that had been what drove him to act the way he did, and to learn what he could. He wasn’t going to let such a thing happen again, and his abilities he’d gained, learned even with a heavy workload, had at least given him a chance to save lives when they tried such things again.

“I’m still surprised that you would take on such a case so early in your career, my boy. Especially after all that negative reports about you from a year ago.”

So some of it is mixed with my own past, and the rest with hers. “It’s for my own reasons, Mr. Grossberg.”

“Well, you still asked for this so forcefully yesterday. Did you really have the time to look over everything?”

Edgeworth frowned at him as Grossberg said, “D-don’t glare at me like that, you’ll upset our client. He’s just a null, you know...timid enough, but still…”

“He’s a null in college. I would think he’s used to glares,” Edgeworth said, not wanting to spend anymore time with Grossberg than he had to as he looked back over at where Phoenix sat. He was younger, though his hair was still styled the same, and he wore a mask over his face, though it wasn’t enough to cover the bruises to one side as Edgeworth slowly walked up, looking him over and frowning at the used, worn levis, holes in his sneakers, and the odd, almost blindingly pink sweater with a large, red heart embroidered into it, a yellow ‘P’ in the middle. The red scarf at least looked comfortable and possibly new, but he couldn’t tell for sure.

“Mr. Wright?”

“yeah...it’s like the nulls who flew, but everyone--.” he stopped, looking up and blinking as he saw Edgeworth. “M-Miles?”

It got a smile from Edgeworth, even if he felt some warning that Phoenix recognized him, but still, the mix was not going to affect Phoenix’s memories...he hoped. “Yes. I was asked by a colleague, Mia Fey, to take over. She should be here--.”

“I’m calm! Look at how calm I am!”

Remind me to not get on her bad side. He thought as he looked over to where she asked Mr. Grossberg to leave, allowing the two of them to deal with it while she came up and gave Phoenix an almost manic smile. “Mr. Wry?”

“It’s Wright,” he told her, glaring as she returned it, “I have this. Why not go and bother Grossberg for us some more? He tends to talk about his issues that diverge into the...TMI...status.”

A sudden, violent sneeze got them both to look back at Phoenix, who looked miserable as Mia asked, “Do you have a cold?”

“...yeah. I’ve had it for a bit, ‘cause of the weather.”

It had been rainy, if Edgeworth recalled, and unnaturally cold for April, and that Phoenix had always hated cold weather, especially cold rain. A few of their classmates had always taken advantage of that discomfort.

A few more violent sneezes made Edgeworth flinch in sympathy before he pulled out a handkerchief from a pocket and handed it to him, Phoenix shaking his head as he pulled out some tissues to use and continued to look down as Mia told him that they would prove him innocent if he was really innocent and, therefore, had nothing to worry about. Edgeworth waited for her to move away before he asked, quietly to not draw any more attention to them, “What happened? You’re hurt?”

Phoenix looked away. “‘s nothing. A few of the other students were upset over what happened. They were just stopping me from leaving.”

Edgeworth sighed, reaching out a bit to touch Phoenix over the hideous pink sweater. “You need to be honest with us here, Phoenix. I know you don’t know Mia, and things are really bad...but trust me.”

Phoenix blinked at him, and seemed to smile a bit under his mask. “I trust you, Miles. I always have...but…” he looked away, muttering, “I wanted to save you...this time.”

Edgeworth let out a breath as their time came to go into the courtroom, “I’m here for you, Phoenix. You have saved me, in more ways than you know.”

Phoenix blinked at him and blushed lightly as they headed into the courtroom. Mia, walking beside him, asked, “Do you want to take the lead on this?”

“If it will help him.”

“It might,” she said, “and I know what we have to find. When it comes up, I’ll be able to get it.” She paused as they got to the courtroom before she said, “She’ll be hard, Edgeworth. Even if this memory is working around us, she will still be hard to gain information from that she hasn’t already tried to explain away.”

“Her explanations were flimsy before,” he said simply, “and your own motivations were not that good or worth getting his trust. I’ll do my best for him, and to get to the truth.”

--

He forgot how insufferable Payne could be when he was dealing with females - the man was good enough to treat everyone with equal contempt, but he was particularly worse when it came to women. Mia glared him down despite that and they easily worked through the basics of the case before Phoenix was brought up to testify.

He’s nervous, and at first starts to say something when Mia talks to him that Edgeworth easily takes apart before he puts his hand down, startling him. How shaken is he about this whole thing? And how are his powers reacting to all of this?

“Phoenix, I know you’re nervous, and I know you want this over with. But I need you to trust me, alright? Tell me what happened, like before.”

Mia is quiet, curious, as Phoenix slowly nods and starts again, explaining more and given a better testimony as to what happened, allowing for doubt to come into Payne’s idea as Edgeworth points out the contradictions in evidence as well as the testimony that he gave. Of course, Payne chuckles and says he has a witness to everything. They retired for a fifteen-minute break as Mia asked Grossberg about looking something up while Edgeworth asked Phoenix about his girlfriend, ‘Dollie’.

“We’ve been dating for a few months,” Phoenix said, looking happy as he added, “We actually met here. I’m so lucky...all my friends and the people I really care about seem to be met when I’m around the law.”

“So...in August?”

“August 27th,” he said happily, taking out a familiar necklace and showing it to him. “She gave me this, said some of the best things, and we’ve been inseparable ever since. She’s kinda odd, though.”

“How so?”

“She keeps asking for it back,” he told him, and Edgeworth could almost see the odd thoughts that Phoenix had about it, how he didn’t actually think that was ‘odd’ or ‘cute’, but something was forcing his mind back to that, to not thinking about it too much.

Edgeworth is quiet for a long moment before he asks, “Do you mind if I hold it for right now? I promise that at the end of the trial, if all goes well.”

He looks happy and quickly gives it over to Edgeworth, who wraps it in the handkerchief that Phoenix had not taken before. He doesn’t know what will happen in this, but he does know that the woman will do her best to attack Phoenix.

I’m going to protect you in this ‘memory’, he thought, no matter what.

--

Dahlia is every bit the woman he remembers, which is to say she quickly bats her eyes at Payne and giggles a bit at the Judge and the only two not swooning is himself and Mia. The glares the two send to the defense is also not something that he can quite believe, especially after he had to deal with Hawthrone a year ago and she attempted to employ the same tactics.

“I’m sure there must be some mistake...Feenie wouldn’t kill anyone. I just know it.”

It lead into her testimony about what she’d seen, and he was almost grateful that she’d not be around to hear his own testimony. Various witnesses could sometimes tell different stories, but even with them telling the same ones, there was always a break in them.

Mia took the reigns on questioning her, getting Hawthorne to chuckle a bit as she said, “You two haven’t changed a bit, Madame Fey, Mister Edgeworth.”

“W-what’s this? You all have met before?”

“Yes,” Edgeworth answered, “Once.”

He allowed Mia to tear down the first bit of testimony, noting how easy it was, but also noticing what she was doing and poking her a bit as she continued. “She’s doing this to make it look like she was going to save him, and you just gave her a nice way out.”

“I know,” she muttered as they continued anyway, the first round almost giving them a chance to blame the death on the lightning in the area, though Dahlia’s surprise made him frown as he watched her. She’s less nervous than she was during the Fawles case. What pushed her?

He shifts and pulls out the necklace, looking at it before he frowned and saw something like a rune on it.

She’s a Pharmakon who makes sigils...or was she a Pharmakon who made poisons...or was she both?

He allows Mia to carry the defense as she points out the issues with what the prosecution had jumped to as far as a conclusion went. He noticed Dahlia seeming to think quickly, the attention off of her and allowing her to return to the near-calm she’d showed when she was first on the stand before asking to give another testimony.

Miles sent a small signal that he had this testimony as Mia backed down while she tried to pin the blame on him rather haphazardly, saying that the events had happened in less than a minute. He objected to that, saying, “That’s quite enough, witness.”

“I’m afraid I don’t understand,” she said before he presented his evidence - the hand wrapped around the bottle (Coldkiller X, what is it about it that he so fears?) and the wristwatch having stopped at the time of death.

“The watch stopped at the exact time of death...3:05pm. The time the building suffered the power outage what at what time again, Mr. Payne?”

“Oh, that’s easy. It was at 2:55...WHAT?”

He felt almost powerful as he said, “Would you care to explain to the court, Ms. Dahlia Hawthorne, what exactly happened in that ten-minute interval?”

When she held her umbrella even harder, he said, “It’s the defense’s position that it was during this interval that the real murderer killed Mr. Swallow. In fact, we believe we’re ready to name who the real killer is.”

“Very well, then, who is the real killer?”

“Dahlia Hawthorne,” the two said as Dahlia tried to get out of it by crying as Edgeworth pushed on instead, “Ten minutes passed between the time the cable broke and the time of the electrocution! What were you doing that whole time, Ms. Hawthrone? Were you cheering them on as they both fought and you listened to music? I must say, that sounds quite callous. I find it hard to believe that you didn’t even lift a finger to stop a fight between the men ‘dearest’ to you!”

“H-how can you say such a mean thing? I...I didn’t do anything!”

“HOLD IT!” the familiar sound surprises him enough that he jerks as he sees Phoenix standing, fighting to get to the stand where he’d given his testimony. “Your Honor, please, I...I have something I want to say!”

“Y-you! Mr. Wright, sit down!”

The bailiff that attempted to push Phoenix down failed as he said, “Please, Miles, please, don’t do this! Dollie...she...she wouldn’t do something like that! She couldn’t!”

“Back to your seat!” the Judge demanded as the bailiff finally got Phoenix under control, though he seemed to be rougher than he normally was with defendants, enough that Phoenix winced as he sneezed and coughed so much it sounded like he could hardly breath.

Mia paused to speak with Mr. Grossberg quickly before returning with a police report.

Dahlia’s question of her motivation before Mia said, “We request further testimony from Ms. Hawthorne, about the events that occurred the day she met Mr. Phoenix Wright.”

Dahlia allows the testimony, explaining that they’d met in August and how she saw it as ‘destiny’ that she’d run into her ‘Feenie’. Though it had been Mia’s boyfriend who was killed, he took the lead on pushing for information about it, feeling Mia’s presence simply being something to hold them there so they could prove what happened to Phoenix.

He hates how upset Phoenix looks, enough that the small connection used to get him into this memory/dream is starting to vibrate with it, and the push to show Dahlia’s motivation and reason for even dating Phoenix, let alone why she was going through all this trouble, suddenly gets him to yell “OBJECTION!” when everything seems to stop.

Everything but them, and he looks over at Phoenix as he sees the multitude of locks, a few of them almost vibrating as they start to break.

“Miles, please...stop this. I can’t let you...I can’t…”

“You can’t admit to something that, when you look back on it, seems so obvious. You were lead around,” he slowly showed off the necklace, “and you know why.”

“Miles…”

“I saved you once from a mob that was determined to blame you no matter what. I am here now because I want to save you from this woman, and from what her memory might do to you. I know what it’s like to doubt yourself, to doubt what happened to the point of blaming yourself for it all. I want to save you from that. I want you to trust me, here, in this place where we can trust each other. You’re here to be a lawyer, and one day will stand here to prove those you trust innocent. You’re here to find the truth. Let me show you the truth.”

He remembers how he’d been when it had been against von Karma. The battle had been hard, and Phoenix had fought his best to show Miles the truth, to show him what really happened. Miles had been reluctant then, but he trusted Phoenix when they were in court, when there was evidence and his own motivation to back it up.

Two of the lighter red locks suddenly burst, the chains near them going slack, and Phoenix swallowed before he said, “I...I trust you, Miles. I do. More than even her.”

A darker lock rattled as time seemed to move again, Miles turning his head to glare at Dahlia Hawthorne. I will take you down for what you did to him.

He wonders if this was the anger and protective instinct that made them so powerful when they’d faced down Miles’ own demon, nearly a year ago.

“You needed to get the necklace back from Phoenix because he was so proud of such a beautiful thing. He showed it to everyone, even people who didn’t think a low-level and a null should date, and that drew attention to you. It’s not like your past is hidden from public record either. You had to get it back, and when he wouldn’t, the only thing you could think of was to get rid of him.”

Mia looked triumphant as she shows off the necklace. “It’s got a tiny bottle too...it’s not full now, but it’s big enough for a small dose of poison to be hidden in it, and for someone to fiddle with and dump into a coffee cup when the person questioning them has their back turned. Of course, the question of where to hide it came up, but it was just your luck that a null was downstairs, and was so ready to believe that you loved him even before you put on the necklace.”

Of course it’s that observation that gets Phoenix to fight so hard he manages to knock Mia out, push past Miles, and race away while the bailiff goes after him. Miles lets out a low curse as Mia slowly wakes and curses herself. “I forgot that part.”

“What, that you would push someone who’d been under a spell for so long that he’d bolt?” Miles asked, “I get that you and Diego were intimate, but at least I don’t start fights with my lawyer who is out for revenge.”

She glared at him as she stood, dusting herself off as Phoenix is brought back in while she growls out, in a low voice so only Miles can hear, “Her true self is about to show and I don’t want him to go through this again. You being here--”

“I’m doing my best for him, and two locks broke because of me, a few others are open. Did you never explain to him about what that woman can do?”

She’s silent as Phoenix comes back in and he looks at him, worried before asking, feeling time start to stop and slow around them, “Phoenix...where’s the necklace?”

“I...ate it.”

“...WHAT?”

“I ate it. I couldn’t...there wasn’t...I managed to break it up and eat it. I...I feel fine.”

Miles looked at him, and let out a sigh. “You’re not. I may have only known you a year, but I can tell when you’re not ‘fine’.” Phoenix was paler than before, and he shook his head, adding, “No, I’m here. I’m fine. You were wrong.”

“I doubt it,” Miles pointed out, “because I also wanted to say something before Miss Fey so rudely interrupted me. I’m guessing that Doug Swallow told you this - three things, supposedly non-lethal, were stolen from his department. Why he was so worried, enough to call you out, was for two reasons - the first was that someone found those three components could be lethal in a very specific way...mixed together, and in tiny doses. The second was that the two times they were stolen were at very specific times - once before the poisoning mentioned, when you met Dahlia...and just a day ago, after you lost your medicine.”

The locks, or at least the outline, appeared again as Phoenix seemed to shake even more. “Y-yes.”

“He also didn’t hit the pole, did he?” Miles watches as more of the lighter locks, and one of the darker ones, begins to vibrate as he continues, “But even through that haze you had of loving Dahlia, you wondered. You walked back, and saw her over Doug’s body.”

“Y-y-yes.”One of the lighter locks broke, and Miles let out a breath before finally speaking up, trying to take control of the odd memory/dream that they were in, to push the event forward. “Whatever you are trying to hide from me, Phoenix, it won’t change what I think of you. I’m here because you have saved me. I’m here to return the favor, and save you from the bad dreams that you have. I’m here to make sure you’re alright, because I know you’re not. That poison was still there, and you’re barely keeping yourself upright because your body can do the one thing everyone else’s couldn’t. You’re fighting the very real poison she was going to douse you with, and that you know you wouldn’t be able to defeat if you’d taken it.”

“I...I…”

Phoenix looked panicked as Miles sees Dahlia finally speak. “Feenie...what a joke you are. Honestly, how can any woman ever count on you for anything? I even told you time and time again to keep your trap shut about me and that necklace….You disgust me!”

Miles looked at her with his arms crossed, feeling more like himself, a self that had six years to learn from his mistakes, then the fool he had been in his youth. “And you’re delusional, Ms. Hawthorne. The trial is pretty much over.”

“That’s fine. You and she seem determined to paint me as a criminal.”

“As I said, delusional. You are a criminal. Besides, you weren’t planning on killing Phoenix with the little bottle he wore around his neck. Not when you’d used that up to kill the attorney in the cafeteria.”

“You don’t have any proof, so I’ll be heading home now.”

“No, you won’t,” the Judge said. Miles isn’t surprised that the Judge, the one who often falls for every line but is also impartial so long as there is evidence, speaks up.

Dahlia turns, her face hidden in darkness, as she says, “Hmph. Fine! Then ask that bastard to finish up already!”

He pulled out the Coldkiller X. “He lost this, and you found it. Yet it was found in Doug Swallow’s hand...tell me, Ms. Hawthorne, how willing are you to test this? You’re not allergic--”

“DON’T GIVE HER THAT!”

Phoenix, still looking the same as he had five years ago, stood in front of Miles has he threw the bottle across the courtroom, the bottle shattering at the same time as almost all of the lighter red locks, and one darker red one, broke. Behind them, the rest of the court played out as it had years before, stopping again as Dahlia glared at them and asked if they thought they’d won.

“It’s not really Coldkiller X...it’s something you took, trying to keep your power from working.”

Phoenix looks away, as if that will stop everything, but Miles does his best to follow, to force Phoenix into looking at him as well. “It didn’t matter if it was poisoned or not, it would have killed her, because that was made for you, and hidden in something that you know no one would question, not when hiding your real self resulted in you getting so ill as soon as the weather turned cold.”

“Miles, please...please stop this. I can’t...I...this memory, it’s painful. Mia’s gone. She...Dollie was right, I can’t help anyone in my life - Mia, Maya, you...I’ve hurt everyone. Because of me, she...that…”

“It’s not because of you that she is the way she is, Phoenix.”

“She was so different when we were together. She was nothing like that. I would...I wanted, and it…” the chains around him rattled as he tried to make sense of it. “Please, please just...just leave me alone. Leave. I’m not...I’ll just…”

“I’m not leaving you alone, Phoenix, and I’m not going to believe that you made her that way, because I know Dahlia Hawthorne. Even when I knew her, a year before all of this,” he motioned to the courtroom that was stalled, to the frozen group, “even then, she was the same way. Mia Fey may say that their meeting had nothing to do with the case, but it had everything to do with why she took your case in particular.”

The scene changed, and he saw Phoenix sitting next to Terry Fawles, the chains making him look even more like the escaped criminal than Fawles himself was, as Mia stood straight, Armando at her side like that first lone trial, a year before.

Chapter Text

February 16, 2013

Mia wants to hug Diego the moment she sees him next to her, but despite that the memory of the case plays out like the drama it is. Her client believes in her to a degree, but it’s also obvious that his mind snapped somewhere. If the necklace he took the poison from was the same as the one that Dahlia had given Phoenix, it makes sense that he’s watching as Dahlia tries to get away with framing her former lover for murder. Mia can see the chains and locks, wound so tightly around Phoenix that it’s almost painful to see, and he looks more like a prisoner and the convicted than Fawles ever did, even with his huge stature and intimidating looks.

Listening to “Melissa” try to work her magic on the group, Mia now has the chance to notice that it seems like Edgeworth was the only one ever to avoid her charms. Well, him and Diego, but it makes her frown as she realizes that Edgeworth hadn’t look at Dahlia as some wilting flower. For whatever reason, he didn’t trust her testimony on stand...and that was why he kept her until he absolutely had to, as well as why he did his own investigation.

von Karma would have put that woman on the stand, after ensuring that her testimony had no holes. Dahlia should be grateful that Edgeworth took her case and not his mentor...this wouldn’t have flown with von Karma’s handling of things.

“What’s going on here, Kitten?” Diego’s voice is low as he speaks to her, the scene seeming to slow when Phoenix sees Dahlia from that year before they met, standing and waiting to give her testimony to damn Fawles.

“I...Diego?”

“The boy wonder there is madder than a hornet, and you’re...something happened, didn’t it? I haven’t heard you in ages, Kitten.”

She winces as the reminder. Because of Redd White, she hadn’t been able to see him, hadn’t had the chance to go and visit him to see how he was doing, if he was getting better or still in the same state. “I...it’s a long story, Diego. I don’t know what to say, and I don’t know if we have the time to talk. But, we’re in a ceremony of memory...that young man there, he--.”

She stopped when she felt hot, as if the day had gone from a cool morning to a scorching afternoon, and she glanced over at where Phoenix was.

He was glowing, a blue-white color surrounding one of the darkest locks, as he shook his head. “Stop it...you’re wrong, you’re wrong!”

“This isn’t some revised way of things, Phoenix,” Edgeworth told him, “This is how it really was. I introduced Dahlia into the courtroom as a witness. Mia proved who she was...and the man to her side, Diego Armando, was the one who was poisoned.”

If anything, the heat started to get unbearable as Phoenix shook his head. “no…”

“That same poison that you ate, he took in too,” Edgeworth pushed on, his new self seeming to come through just as much as his younger self. She blinked as she realized what had been hiding under the surface as Diego huffed, sweating. “It’s gotten hot in here, Kitten.”

“It’s Phoenix. He’s the one doing this…” She remembered how hard things had been for him, and how he’d reacted when she told him he was a defense attorney. It wasn’t just his focus on believing and defending his clients...it was finding the truth.

And Edgeworth wants that too. Only in the courtroom have those two ever gotten the full truth of anything. It’s the only place, standing against each other, that they can trust that they will be able to pull out the truth from a witness or from the evidence.

She slammed her hands on the table as she said, “Phoenix, I taught you better than that!” Diego shifted by her side, obviously worried, as she continued, “I told you how the court worked. Evidence and testimony here is the only thing - if one doesn’t add up, the other will! You saw how Dahlia acts, how she treats those who love her. How can you still defend her?”

Phoenix is quiet, as usual a horrible client, with the chains around him rattling hard as she continues, “Dahlia Hawthorne murdered her half-sister and shoved her body into the trunk! We’ve proven that she knew what Valerie Hawthorne was doing and why! She jumped over Dusky Bridge and left her lover to face murder charges, just as she nearly had you facing murder charges for her crime!”

“Mia, please...it’s...it’s all my…”

“You never met her when she was fourteen and told Fawles to kidnap her for the ransom,” Mia reminded him, crossing her arms, “You didn’t meet her even a year before this, when she told everyone she’d seen Fawles kill her half-sister, the only one who knew of her survival. You met her after she’d poisoned Diego and needed a safe place to hide the one thing the police were looking for.”

Edgeworth looked at Phoenix as he said, “The only people you’ve known that long are myself and Larry. Of the two of us, you’ve only ever had any sort of connection with me, Phoenix. What I did, what happened last year, that was my problem, that was not something created by you. I didn’t change or become the way I am because of you or because of that connection.”

“You...you’re lying. You both...it’s not…”

Diego let out a breath as he said, “I think I know what we need to do. Kitten, maybe we should see if a trial will work.”

“A trial?” she asked, confused.

“Of course. You and Edgeworth want to prove that it’s not because of him that Hawthorne is the way she is...so let’s see if I can help. Call me as a witness.”

“Diego…”

“I was the reason she met him, and no matter what, this ceremony is still a trial. In a trial, evidence is what counts, as well as airtight testimony. If there are no holes, then the testimony is the truth, and will hold up or enhance the evidence. You and the boy wonder say that Dahlia was that way before, but he’s not taking the physical evidence...so maybe testimony is the only way to go.”

Phoenix is shaking, the heat seeming to amp up as Diego, looking over at him, added, “Besides, I think he needs someone outside of you two to talk to him right now. No matter what, he’s not sure if he can trust you two with this. Let me help, Kitten.”

She finally nodded as he walked up, waiting before Edgeworth asked, looking a bit pained, “Name and occupation?”

“I’m Diego Armando. I’m a defense attorney, and Mia’s boyfriend. Well, I am here, anyway.”

“You’d best be a bit more clear about that, then.”

Diego sipped his coffee as he added, “I’m the defense attorney that was poisoned by Dahlia Hawthorne, after I asked her to the courthouse to answer a few questions.”

The temperature seemed to spike briefly before slowly lowering, Phoenix looking at him as Edgeworth, arms crossed, said, “Can you tell us about that day?”

“Of course,” Diego said, “I don’t seem to have anything but time on my hands now.” He looked over at Phoenix before he said, “I asked Ms. Hawthorne to come to the courthouse in August, nearly a year after the trial here. I told her I needed to clear up a few things about her half-sister’s death, as well as finally give over some of the items she’d been left by her. Of course, it also required her to file paperwork about being under an assumed name, and how she kept in contact with her sister, the like. We talked for only a bit before I looked away when one of the police came up with some of the paperwork we needed. When I took a drink of the coffee I had, I started to seize and cough. Pretty sure I saw some red blood on my hands before I passed out.”

“I see,” Edgeworth said, looking upset by the description, “How could you be so sure it was Ms. Hawthorne who poisoned you?”

“She was the only one in reach of my coffee cup, and even if it was in the cafeteria that we met, we were in a secluded area. I turned my back on her without realizing she had the poison with her.”

Mia pushed that statement, seeing Phoenix looking lost and almost hopeful for an opening, “How do you know it was the poison that she used?”

“I remember what happened to Fawles as much as you two do,” Diego told them. Next to Phoenix, Fawles coughed, blood running down his cheek, as Diego coughed himself, blood coloring his hand. “I figured after nearly a year, maybe it’s potency had worn down. It’s why I didn’t fall over dead like poor Fawles.”

Their client slumped over, dead, a familiar necklace in his hand, and Diego’s coffee mug dropped out of his hands, spilling the remains as he added, “Still...it hurts. It’s odd how badly it still hurts, even when I’m pretty sure my brain shut down or I’m only being kept alive by some very determined doctors. It’s potent enough to kill with just a small bit, and yet that small bit that disappeared for five years killed a man like Fawles, but left me where I am.” He glanced at Phoenix, Mia looking over as she felt the heat of the room seeming to rise a bit even as the chains glowed white-hot around him. Edgeworth seemed worried over what was going on, and she had a feeling that he knew the trial part, this ceremony, was going to come to an end soon but that Phoenix’s locks required more work.

Work and arguments and memories that, right now, only he shared with Phoenix.

She blinked when he stood, seemingly free of the chains, and walked over to Diego. He seemed to be moving on instinct, shivering as he did so, before he reached up. She nearly screamed as she saw the bits of blue-white flame around Phoenix move onto Diego, seeming to move through and around him as Mia realized what it was, what that meant. Phoenix hated being around hospitals, or those who needed to be seen and have their photos taken, but he was also prone to hating cold weather, to only getting sick after he’d been so over-stressed by something or someone.

Diego didn’t, or couldn’t, move as the fire moved all around him, seeming to engulf him, and she saw the lines of the poison in him, keeping his chakra’s closed off, sapping his power instead of taking it fully, as they had taken Fawles’. Phoenix’s fire burned all over, chasing the poison away or destroying it easily, though as it moved through some of the higher chakras, it was obvious that the poison had left behind it’s own marks. Diego’s bright eyes had dulled, and his hair, once all black without any signs of aging, was now white, as if all the color had been leeched out. He blinked and staggered as Phoenix walked back, seeming to come to his senses as he suddenly coughed, blood spraying over the floor as Edgeworth moved to try to get to him, Mia yelling for him before she and Diego seemed to be thrown aside, pushed out into the lobby as the doors shut and wrapped with heavy, dark locks.

Mia looked over there as she heard the voice of Fressia saying, “He’s broken the ceremony with you, Mia Fey. You have thirty minutes before you and the other spirit must return.”

Thirty minutes. She had to trust that Edgeworth could fix Phoenix now, that he could break the locks around him. She didn’t know how else she could - she’d shown him what she could, but she wasn’t going to lose this time with Diego. Not when after this, he would have to learn the truth.

“Kitten,” he muttered as she moved next to him, helping him up, “the hell was that?”

“Phoenix...I guess he can heal?”

“He didn’t heal me, Kitten. He took that poison from me, and ouch did that hurt,” he rubbed his head as he blinked a bit. “Also made things harder to see. You’re going to have to stay really close, Kitten, so I can see your pretty face.”

She let out a wet laugh, feeling tears running down her eyes. “Diego...I don’t care how, I’m just so happy to see you again.”

He chuckled, reaching up to touch the side of her face and slowly move her closer so he could give her a kiss. “Even if when I wake up I’m blind, so long as you’re with me…”

Her heart hurt, and she shook her head, slowly moving a bit away as he frowned, confused. “Kitten?”

“Diego...I can’t be there. I can’t be with you.”

He froze, still confused and hurt, as she finally drew in a breath and said what she hadn’t wanted to say before, what she’d feared telling him the moment she realized he wasn’t just a memory. “I died, Diego, nearly two years ago. I’m so sorry.”

--

He’s amazed and concerned when Armando and Fey are thrown out of the courtroom, though he’s also grateful that he’s able to break and rush to catch Phoenix, feeling his body, or the representation of it, heat up so quickly that it’s almost painful to touch him. Miles still holds onto him, watching as the courtroom disappears and instead, finding himself on a blasted tundra of some sort, the ground underneath cracking like it was ready to explode, and something long and dark, like a spike, stuck in the area near them, twisting the landscape and holding it down as the rest buckled and broke in spurts, as if protesting the lock.

“Miles,” Phoenix’s voice was weak, though the heat was dying down a bit, “Miles, please stop this. Please leave.”

“No,” he said, stubborn even as he saw what there was around him, what might easily hurt if not kill them both. “I’m not leaving here until you realize you’re wrong about yourself. You didn’t hurt that woman. She was like that before you ever came into her sights.”

“I hurt you.”

“You didn’t. I hurt myself,” Edgeworth said, wishing he had the ability to show Phoenix what was going on. He didn’t feel any of Fressia’s power here, and with only them being here, it was possible that either Phoenix had broken out of the ceremony by healing Diego, or taking on his illness, or that they were the only two still in the ceremony.

“I believed what von Karma said, but after what happened at my father’s trial, after what I believed but couldn’t allow myself to believe, I was in no state to fight back against the abuse that was done. I didn’t start to fight back until I got your letters.”

Phoenix leaned heavily against him, not looking up, the dark locks around him still stuck in place and seeming to trap him, but the area around them seemed to rumble, like the onslaught of an earthquake.

Edgeworth did his best to breath, to not fall to the fear he had from his childhood, as he continued despite it. “No matter what von Karma said or did, no matter how hard things got, I had two things to fall back on - I had Franziska’s presence, and your letters.”

Miles, How’s Germany treating you? I know you don’t always respond to these, or you just can’t, but I hope you can one day--

Miles, Things are going ok here, I got an award for that drawing I did--

Miles, I’m out. I can’t take it. Dad...what he said, I can’t take it anymore. I’m not going back ever again--

“That last letter, that last one finally pushed me enough to come back. I came back here to see if you were alright, but no matter how I tried, I couldn’t find you. I didn’t have the time, or I was...I was afraid you’d see me and not want to deal with me again. After all, I was the Demon Prosecutor. I was everything I hadn’t been all those years ago. That wasn’t you, though. That was my father’s death, my adoption by von Karma, the training he pushed me through, and the choices I made. You only ever helped me remember who I was, and what type of a person I wanted to see across from me, fighting for their clients.”

Phoenix is still leaning against him, and he blinks, as if seeing the landscape for the first time, and frowns.

“It’s supposed to be a tundra.”

Edgeworth frowns at the change, looking over the blighted and near-volcanic landscape with the spike stuck deep into it, something so unnatural in this place. “Why would you put a tundra here? Why cover your power with that?”

“So it doesn’t get out of control. So no one’s hurt.”

He didn’t like how easily Phoenix answers him, or how he rests so heavily against Edgeworth, still wrapped in chains and dark locks still on him. He looks over the landscape again before he asks, “When did you put up a tundra, Phoenix?”

“After you died,” Phoenix mutters, sounding tired. “I didn’t want to hurt anyone again. It got through everything else I put up…I thought it wouldn’t get through this. Now I just…”

Edgeworth glanced at the way it looked. A tundra…snow and earth to hold down fire, that instead turned into this?

“If I take out that spike, or if it leaves, what happens?”

Phoenix didn’t answer, prompting Edgeworth to shift him so he looked at him. “Phoenix, please tell me.”

“It’s all slipping away,” Phoenix muttered, wavering as the locks seemed to wind tighter around him.

“Tell me what will happen, Phoenix.”

He looked young, younger than before, and one of the locks shook as he said, “I’ll go away, like grandpa did.”

Edgeworth swallowed, seeing his own body seem to get as young as Phoenix was as he said, “You can’t let that happen, Phoenix! Please don’t.”

Phoenix sniffed, looking sad as he said, “But that’s what happens. I was a bad boy, I did a bad thing, I hurt…hurt you. I have to fade away and die.”

“You didn’t hurt me! I’m fine, I’m here with you. You never hurt me, those other people did!”

He hears the District Prosecutor and other voices speaking rapidly, but one thing seems to play over and over as Phoenix looks at him, as if confused.

Get the Null out of your system. Just get that null out of your system. The null is apparently good for two things, not just one. A versatile null, sounds almost worth it.

They’re adults again, and Edgeworth sighs. “I hate that you’re boiled down to that word, to what that means, just because you don’t have conventional magic. Without you, I wouldn’t have been able to face von Karma, let alone defeat him. That and being pushed to be more like him, to get results instead of seeing what I saw we could do in the courtroom – to pull out the truth, to learn what really happened and use that to find the reasons or motivations that would give us the real culprit, no matter how painful the subject – that was too much for me at that time, Phoenix. It was nothing you did or said. If it wasn’t for you, I would have been in prison, and von Karma free. If we hadn’t faced off and worked together during that case, we wouldn’t have saved Ema Skye, or Adrian Andrews. You gave me the ability to defeat von Karma, no matter how it felt afterwards. I know I pushed at times, and you weren’t ready, or afraid of what could happen.” He glanced up at him as he finally said, “I know your mother is the Harpy – that her real name is Mikeyla Goffe. But why are you and your father so afraid of what will happen to me, of what it will do to me?”

Phoenix is quiet, as if trying to figure out what to think, and he suddenly shakes his head. “No. You’ll hate me.”

“She tried to drown you,” Edgeworth reminded him, “and if she comes near you again, I, Maya, and everyone else will work to make her see the error of it. Whatever you did, it was in your own defense.”

Phoenix shook his head. “Dad…dad said she loved us. Before that, she loved us.”

“Before what?”

“I…before I tested.”

Miles felt shock. Most children showed signs of power, or were tested for power, around the age of four. Phoenix had managed to show off his power, his real power, by the time he was that age. But he would have registered as a null, a null child of a lineage who’s family—

Mikeyla Goffe is a Shaman who can read a possible future. She’d know enough to see the answer to whatever question she wanted to ask. Whatever she Saw, it forced her to try to kill Nick.

But that wasn’t all. The locks were rattling hard, harder than they ever had, and Edgeworth considered as he looked at Phoenix, wrapped up and so afraid of his power, afraid of what it meant, of feeling everyone else—

“Your father said she loved you, before you were tested,” Edgeworth said slowly, noticing the chains shake even more even as the area around them began to billow out with clouds of hot, acidic air. Even if I fix this, fixing what’s underneath, all that he’s shoved in here, is going to take a long while. “But…how long have you been able to feel everyone else?”

“I…I don’t…” more and more of the tundra cracked, starting to even upset and move out the spike, as Edgeworth pushed on.

“You knew I was depressed. I felt you in my mind, felt you trying to get me to see the light. I told you that. I knew when you were upset when we were younger because you got ‘cold’ – you shut down emotionally and your body heat dropped. So how long could you do that? How long could you feel other people’s emotions?”

Phoenix shook his head even as more and more of the tundra seemed to crack around them.

“You were surprised and terrified when you hurt the woman that birthed you,” he couldn’t bring himself to call Mikeyla Goffe a ‘mother’, or even assign such a term that should convey the love and care that he knew now Phoenix had only gotten in spurts from his father. “And you said your father told you. I suspect he did that to remind you of the dangers of creating links like what we have, but I’m also guessing you got angry at him for another reason, one he didn’t acknowledge or doesn’t remember.”

“Stop it, Miles.”

Edgeworth shook his head. “I told you how I was now, Phoenix. I’m not like my father – I can’t defend people. I’ve been a prosecutor too long to change my profession. But that doesn’t stop me from finding the truth and working with the defense attorneys I can trust, or pushing the prosecutor’s office into not pressuring us into finding a quick and easy scapegoat. Mikeyla Goffe is an easy scapegoat – her family has antiquated ideas, and knowing you were a null child, or looking and seeing something in your future, that would only spur her into taking such an action. Your father is an easy scapegoat – Drake Wright never acknowledged his demons and instead drank when he should have protected you, defended you, or not simply taken the same route that Mikeyla did and think that the way he’d been taught would work for you as well. But he can’t feel emotion like you can, or if he can, he’s too drunk to notice it. Mikeyla is a lineage and her family is selfish and prejudiced against nulls. So how does a child who can feel emotions, a child who feels them so much he calls in sick or hides during high-emotion things, who takes a drug that mixes anti-depressants and tranquilizers in a way that frightens most people…how young would he be when he first started feeling that…and who would he turn to, when his father was busy mourning his own father’s passing and his mother couldn’t know about that ‘secret’…what would he find out and keep for so long that he wouldn’t even use it against his own father when he told him that the mother who tried to kill him, the mother who abandoned them to hunt their own kind…”

“Miles, please, don’t!”

He shook his head again, the dots and the secret behind it so final that he hated to say it, but…

“I thought I killed my own father, Phoenix. Even when it started to become clear I hadn’t, even when you pointed it out, I couldn’t quite bring myself to believe it. I still have that nightmare, and I cannot even fly if there’s turbulence without fainting, or reliving that day. I told you the truth about what happened, and you proved me wrong. You’re hiding behind the one falsehood that you think you can – that your father, who is connected to the woman that birthed you, knows her emotions better than you ever did.”

The chains fell away, leaving only one, dark lock that started to click as Edgeworth said, “Phoenix… just as I’m not responsible for my father’s death, you are not responsible for her leaving, or any of her actions afterwards. If it hadn’t been through you, it might have been through your father, or someone else. But you did know, didn’t you? You knew she never felt for you the same way your father felt for her.”

“…yes.”

The final, dark lock broke, and the spike suddenly melted away, a puddle of dark lava. Phoenix blinked as he looked around, as if confused as the whole area stabilized. Edgeworth managed to reach over and grip Phoenix’s hand, trying to focus on pushing bits of his own Fire and abilities towards him, seeing his friend sway a bit even as, this time, the Fire remained, the link between them getting at least a little larger.

“We…we shouldn’t.”

Miles let out a sigh. He doubted Phoenix would ever be comfortable with the link, just as he couldn’t go through an earthquake without feeling faint or having flashbacks. “You’re recovering from nearly dying on me, Phoenix,” Edgeworth argued back, “and from just admitting to some fairly serious things about your past. Trust my experiences…we need to support each other. We need each other, and we need to wake up and see the others. They’ll be worried.”

“the…others…?”

“Maya and that niece of hers, not to mention Salmone and her sister, or my step-sisters, if they’re still in the states,” he reminded Phoenix of them, watching him seem to come back to himself, to really remember. “Plus after that last case, and a year of being ill…”

“you…saw that. Everything.”

“I saw what happened with Dahlia Hawthorne and the trial,” Edgeworth told him, “but beyond that, nothing else. I had to guess most of it from what  you’ve told me before.”

Phoenix swallowed, looking down, and finally whispered, “She…she felt different. That’s why I was going to stop taking them. Not just then, when I lost the Coldkiller X…but soon. She…I was going to tell her. I only ever felt that with you, and I couldn’t be sure you’d feel the same. But she wasn’t like the one I saw.”

He wants to say it was a lie, that she’d simply been a good actress, that Phoenix had been fooling himself…but he couldn’t think of what purpose that would serve. In the back of his mind, over and over, he thought about the fact that Phoenix had not given Dahlia the necklace back when he should have done whatever she told him to do. His weakened powers, not to mention later his massive cold, would have meant that he was far more susceptible to those sigils. So how had Dahlia made him love her, but be so adamant that it wasn’t her on the stand?

“We can figure that out together,” Edgeworth promised, and was happy to see Phoenix look at him and smile.