Chapter Text
Klavier’s head ached, and told himself it must be the altitude. When the rest of his body followed suit - same thing, right? The lawyer conference contained not only the Prosecutor’s Offices in LA but a few other SoCal offices, and several defense firms. The Wright Anything Agency was there, or at least, Apollo was, all the way to the Northern California mountains.
It’s the altitude, he told himself in the lounge of the main cabin. Or I spent too much time in the cold. It was why he had slouched against the couch cushions, until Apollo waved a hand in his face. “Prosecutor Gavin?”
“Herr Forehead!” he said, putting on a bright smile. His head had progressed to a burning sensation behind his eyelids.
“My panel is about to start, and I thought you’d like to come, but…” The red-suited attorney gave him a once-over, and frowned. “You look kinda rough, maybe you should go rest?”
“Nein, it’s just the altitude, Herr Forehead. It certainly can’t defeat me!” Klavier forced himself upright, attempting to make the movement seem fluid as usual. “In fact, you’re the only one to defeat me so regularly, ja?” In truth, he hadn’t even remembered Apollo’s panel was today. He could have sworn it was tomorrow, but when he checked his phone, the date leapt out at him. I seriously thought it was still November 1…
“If you say so.” Apollo kept frowning.
“Lead the way,” said Klavier, and gestured toward the direction of the lecture room. He grabbed another cup of coffee on the way. Had he managed to sleep much? His mind worked sluggishly, and recalled sweltering in his bed and turning the heat down at least three times. Maybe. It was blurry. But Apollo’s panel beckoned.
Unfortunately, the words stuck together in his mind, making little sense. He’d have to clear his head somehow. Klavier grinned at Apollo as the audience dispersed. “Well done, Forehead! I’m going to clear my head. See you at dinner, bitte?”
A few minutes later, Apollo said to Ema, “He kind of looked like shit, maybe we should make sure he doesn’t do something stupid?”
Klavier meandered along the woodland trail between the cabins and main buildings. The snow started falling more thickly, and his face prickled with anxiety or heat or both. Snow was Germany. It was not Los Angeles. Snow were his parents and the hill behind their house -
Blood froze on snow very fast, and he tried to not sob at the pain in his nose. It was bloody and trailing scarlet. He grabbed onto a tree, pulling upright, glaring at the tree root he’d fallen over. “Kris! Kris, my nose…”
Kristoph preferred English these days, it was more ‘refined,’ or ‘world-wide standard,’ whatever those meant. Besides, Klavier knew his brother was going to study law in America! So he made a careful habit of speaking English to him.
Kristoph crested the hill Klavier had run and subsequently tripped down, glasses blinding between the snow and sunlight. He proceeded down the hill gracefully, and his gaze lingered on the bloody snow for several seconds. “Tilt your head back,” he instructed, and wiped Klavier’s face with a handkerchief. His fingertips came away a drying maroon.
Klavier had no idea where in the woods he had gone. The trail had vanished, and he stumbled for a while, trying to find it again. Heat burned in his face, and the scratchy throat gave way to a painful cough. He slid down on the ground between two tree roots, and watched the snow fall.
When he brushed his hands over his face, they came away with rusty smears, his lips cracking bloody. It’s just the altitude… Well, maybe. You keep telling yourself that, a voice snipped in his head that sounded uncannily like Apollo.
Apollo frowned as the snow intensified, heading with Ema to the door. “We should probably tell people we’re going to look for him…”
A Snackoo pinged off his head. “I already texted Prosecutor Edgeworth and Detective Gumshoe and Kay, we should be good.”
Ema’s phone dinged. “Actually, Kay is near us and wants to help… oh, wait, Prosecutor Edgeworth apparently thinks we need a chaperone, so we’re getting Detective Gumshoe too.”
“The more the merrier, I guess?” said Apollo, quietly relieved there would be an adult with some kind of seniority.
They stepped outside the building, and Kay Faraday dropped from the low overhang to land in front of them. “Ema!!! And hey, Apollo! Gummy will be here in a second.”
Ema bumped fists with Kay, and Apollo rubbed his forehead. “Kay, you almost gave me a heart attack.”
Fifteen minutes later, sticking to the trail as closely as they could, they hadn’t located Klavier. “He must have gone off the trail,” said Gumshoe, scratching his head.
“Leave it to me, for I am the Great Thief Yatagarasu!” Kay began digging something out of her backpack.
“Kay, don’t go running off into the woods and getting lost -” began Gumshoe worriedly.
“Nah! Don’t worry Gummy, I just need a better aerial view.” Kay swung a grappling hook into the higher branches of a tree, tested her weight, and then climbed up the tree at a speed that made Apollo dizzy. She scanned with a pair of binoculars, and then started. “Yikes! We should probably get to him fast. He’s that way.” She pointed.
His stomach sank faster than Kay’s descent from the tree. He should never have let Klavier - when did he become Klavier, anyway? - out of his sight at this rate.
Detective Gumshoe took charge. “We should have one or two of us stay here while the others go to get him.”
“Oh! We can hook the grappling hook to this branch and you hold the end of the line to make sure you don’t get lost!” Kay beamed. “I’ll stay here - Ema, do you have a cell signal? We should probably call Mr. Edgeworth and medics, I couldn’t quite see how he was doing from over here, but I don’t think it was great…”
It took a couple of minutes to get to Klavier, who had huddled between tree roots; when they approached, Apollo noted that the prosecutor’s face appeared deeply flushed.
“Klavier?” he said, putting a hand on the prosecutor’s shoulder and shaking him a little to get his attention.
Klavier turned his head, looking from Gumshoe to Apollo. “Vater? Es tut mir leid, I couldn’t, I couldn’t… fix it. I couldn’t use the truth… to save…”
“Shit, he’s delirious,” Apollo hissed. “Let’s get him out of here.”
“On it!” Gumshoe took off his outer trenchcoat, and folded Klavier into it, who offered no resistance. The blonde kept rambling in and out of German and English, apologizing incoherently about not helping ‘Kris.’
Apollo stiffened at the nickname for Kristoph Gavin. He should have known Klavier was still in incredible agony over his older brother’s betrayal. But the prosecutor had never said a word, feelings only revealed in the throes of fever and possibly hypothermia.
The first thing to filter through his awareness was a stuffy heat, combined with aching chills in his bones. Klavier struggled to sort through thoughts and memories, somewhere in the stifling darkness. All he could remember so far was blurry voices, applause… Had he been giving a concert? No, that wasn’t right, he didn’t play in a band anymore. Chill and snow and heat… Snow, at altitudes and within evergreen conifers. He could hear distant beeps and muffled voices even now.
“How is he?”
“Better than yesterday, I think.”
Better than what? He might be sick. That could explain it. If he was sick, then he might be in a hospital. But… I wasn’t that sick, it was just the altitude. Sharper memories came through: Insomnia and coffee, fatigue and warmth, being in a room where Apollo Justice spoke on a panel.
A chair scraped nearby, and Klavier managed to make a faint noise, eyelids heavy.
“Klavier?” A hand tentatively patted at his.
“Is the fop awake?” More distantly.
“Apollo,” he tried to say, but it came out more like “‘Lo?” Forced his eyes open a crack.
“Don’t push it, that’s how you ended up here,” said Apollo sternly somewhere to his left.
Klavier opened his mouth to protest, but coughed instead, chest burning. Loose strands of hair fell across his face, and others stuck to his cheeks.
“Get some rest, it’s almost time for the nurse’s round again anyway, all right?”
He managed a faint noise, and soon the sounds faded out around him.