Chapter Text
“Mr. Wright? I need your help.”
“I’m not accepting new clients at the time,” Phoenix said evenly, not looking up from his paperwork. Another day, another signature on the dotted line; that’s how it was with law. “My assistant and I need time to recover after the Engarde trial.”
“I’m sorry. But I don’t know where else to turn, and if you don’t help, she’s going to have to defend herself with my help investigating. I know State vs. Engarde was difficult for you, but Mandy asked me to find you.”
Phoenix dropped his pen, looking up for the first time at his client. “Mandy? Do you mean Amanda Flay?”
The woman nodded, holding out her hand to shake. “I don’t think we’ve officially met; I’m Lily Petrichor, her girlfriend. She said you helped her out during State vs. O’Scope last year, and we crossed paths once or twice but never really spoke to each other.”
“Phoenix Wright; nice to meet you.” He stood up and shook her hand, already half resigned to taking the case. “Does Ms. Flay know that defending oneself in court is typically a bad idea?”
“There’s precedent. You did it once, didn’t you?” she pointed out.
“...my point still stands.”
Ms. Petrichor sighed. “Yeah. The thing is, she got fired as soon as her firm heard about the accusation, and hasn’t had many chances to make connections in the legal world. The only other defense attorney she’s worked with was a blonde guy so sketchy she locked the doors for a week afterwards. She still changes the radio channel whenever a Gavinners song comes on.”
Phoenix shoved his paperwork aside and grabbed his briefcase, the magatama heavy in his pocket. “All right, then. Lead the way.”
Petrichor Flowers, read the side of the van. The inside smelled vaguely of soil and something else, something sweeter. Ms. Petrichor brushed off the passenger seat, plucking a dried leaf that had curled up around the seatbelt, and gestured for Phoenix to get in.
“Come on, I’ll drive you,” she offered. “The detention center isn’t too far. Are you bringing your assistant?”
“No, she sleeps in most mornings.” He neglected to mention that the reason Maya was sleeping in so late was a Steel Samurai marathon with some online friends in a different time zone; she’d been planning it for weeks, after all, and it made her happy.
Ms. Petrichor glanced at the clock, which could no longer be reasonably interpreted as morning, and visibly decided not to question it. Phoenix pulled himself into the van and buckled his seatbelt, noticing the pots of flowers in the back.
“Those are...daisies, right?” He said, attempting to change the subject. “The purple ones.”
She started the car and gave him a strange look. “Those are orchids.”
“Huh. Really?” He hadn’t even known that ‘orchid’ was a type of flower. “So, are they like roses or something?”
“...Mr. Wright, how many flowers would you say you can identify?”
“Three?” Roses, daisies, and tulips were the only ones he’d really needed to learn, right?
Ms. Petrichor made a sudden noise not unlike a startled cat. “H—how?!? Okay, so, orchids are rather hard to raise, but they can be identified by the distinctive petal shape…”
One rather educational car ride later, they’d reached the detention center. Phoenix still couldn’t consistently identify more than three kinds of flowers, but at least now he knew the names of a few more. Apparently his attorney's badge was modeled after a sunflower; who would have guessed?
“Give this to Mandy for me, okay?” She passed him a denim jacket, heavier than it looked and lined with flannel. The collar was soft sherpa, well cared for, and the back was covered in intricately painted flowers and designs.
“You’re not coming in with me?” Phoenix asked.
“I’m not sure if I could keep it together if I did, and I’d rather not get in your way.” She gave a tight smile. “Go on; do your lawyer-type business. I’ll make another personal visit later.”
Phoenix nodded. “Thank you. I’ll make sure it gets to her.”
The entire process didn’t take long— the jacket was briefly inspected by the guard, who gave a curt nod and told Phoenix to wait. Hardly a minute later, Amanda Flay walked up to the other side of the glass, her girlfriend’s jacket draped around her shoulders.
“Long time no see, huh,” she said, with a wry grin. Her shoulders were tense as she dropped into the chair opposite Phoenix, and she wrapped the jacket tighter around herself. “I never did follow up after the O’Scope case— did you recover okay?”
“Believe it or not, I’ve been through worse,” he replied, only half joking.
“That’s not nearly as comforting as you think it is, but okay.” She gave him an apologetic half smile. “Sorry for the trouble. I don’t have a lot of people I can count on, and the alternative would have put a lot of pressure on Lily to do my investigation for me.”
Phoenix barely kept himself from slamming the table and objecting aloud. “You apologize, but you helped me save Edgeworth’s life and barely asked anything in return. In addition, I’m counting on you to be a reliable witness, and believe me when I say those are in short supply these days.”
“I’d say you need to raise your standards, but honestly, that sounds about right.” She laughed quietly. “Witnesses and their perjury, huh?”
“All the goddamn time,” Phoenix agreed. “You’d think the punishment should be more than just a brief slap on the wrist.”
“Right?” She shook her head in exasperation. “Anyways, you came here for my side of the story. Lily had been looking forward to the fair for weeks— I know, small towns have a lot of weirdly specific festivals, but it was an opportunity for her to meet new people who share her interests and find inspiration. We had a date night at her flat the night before, and I stayed over. In the morning, we got dressed and headed over to the festival— I want to say we arrived a little after seven? And both of us helped with the setup.
“The victim, Aster Risc, was an old friend from college who fake dated Lily for a while. It was mainly to get his parents off his back about grandkids, since at the time, we were all financially reliant on our parents. He’d asked me for help managing his stand this year, since these days he makes his living at craft fairs, so I agreed.”
“Does he normally do this?” Phoenix asked.
“Not really, but I think it was more of a favor to Lily than a genuine request for assistance. Vendors get special permissions, and Lily loves coming here. So as soon as the booth was prepared, she left, and Aster and I had some time to catch up. Business was pretty slow; I guess he’d gotten stuck with a bad location, and most of the customers stopped at the booth next to us. There were three people sharing it; a woman with long hair who introduced herself as Ainsley von der Wiese, a quiet man with dark hair named Silas Grayve, and a ginger named Ashton Smoke.
“Grayve got this weird look about him about half an hour in, said he was going to the photo booth, but I didn’t think he was. I waited a few minutes before I told Aster I was going to use the bathroom, and stopped by the photo booth on my way. He wasn’t there, and by the time I returned, Aster was gone. Ainsley von der Wiese was in his seat, said he had followed me, and so Ashton Smoke was covering their booth. I sat back down, and Ashton left. I texted Aster asking where he’d gone, but there wasn’t any response for a few hours, around the time Grayve came back and got into a fight with Ainsley. At this point I was the only person doing any work, so I called Lily. The noise was too loud to make out much, so she came back to the booth. That’s when she opened the cooler, and...found him.”
“The victim’s body?” He clarified.
Flay wrapped the jacket tighter around her shoulders. “Yeah. She’s still pretty shaken up over it, honestly. I just wish I could be there for her.”
“You will soon,” Phoenix promised. “You told me you have a way of knowing when people are lying, didn’t you? Have you gotten any clues from that?”
“No. I’m sorry,” Flay said sadly. “The only thing I can tell you is that all of them were lying in some way. Sometimes it’s a persona they put on in public, or a secret so great it bubbles out and I can feel it, or even just an abundance of politeness, but none of them were genuine. It bothered me; of course it did, and I didn’t trust any of them, but I promised to be there for Aster, so I told Lily it was fine for her to wander the fair.”
“Can you explain more about how this ability works for me?”
She shrugged, shifting in her seat. “I guess. It’s just… I’m very good at reading people. Mostly in terms of whether I consider them a threat— yes, I know it’s fucked up, but that’s how I am. Outright lies, definitely a threat, but I can’t usually tell the truth from just that. Pleasantries, not strictly a threat, but I’ll normally put the energy into determining their real meaning anyways. Deeper secrets, I really should not consider a threat— remember when I suggested that I thought you’d been hurt before due to not knowing when people are lying?”
Phoenix winced. “Yes, I recall.”
“Yeah, sorry. That was...crossing a line. Logically, I know I’m not entitled to every piece of information about everyone I meet, and I’ve been actively working on that. But I can tell when something is wrong, whether I want to or not. The last thing is...more complicated, and there’s some overlap with the other three. The public persona someone puts out, it’s like a general vibe… it’s the one that gives me a lot of false positives, honestly. Like, when I first went up against Prosecutor Edgeworth, he was actually being— surprisingly genuine. Then, well, after the attack, it was like a wall went up. Sometimes people do that to protect themselves, I guess. I think the best way to describe it is that retail workers have this one in spades, but the best actors in theatre have none on stage.”
“None?” As a former theatre kid, that seemed odd.
“None. I think it’s because they’re living their passions, you know? That’s the most genuine thing you can do.” She smiled softly, a fond expression on her face. “That’s why I fell in love with Lily— ah, sorry, didn’t mean to get sappy.”
“I don’t mind,” Phoenix assured her. Personally, he thought that little smile that had crossed her face when she talked about her girlfriend was the most genuine expression he’d ever seen on her. “I just have one last question. You said you’d developed this ability for a reason. Why is that?”
Flay looked away. “I don’t like to talk about that much. All you need to know is I needed it to survive. People like Thaddeus Strange don’t always get put away for murder— sometimes they’re allowed around kids. I know I’m not a pleasant person, and I don’t blame you if you only tolerate me. I dig up people’s emotional scars by accident and I say the wrong thing and I can’t lie even if I try. But I swear to you here and now, I didn’t kill Aster. I didn’t— hire anyone to kill him, I don’t know how it happened or why he was killed, and he was my friend. Please, believe me.”
No psyche-locks appeared. The magatama was cold and inert in his pocket the entire speech. “I believe you,” Phoenix said.
“Only mostly. You still doubt me a little.”
For half an instant, he could feel Mia’s hand on his shoulder, her voice in his ear. Believe in your client, Phoenix. And find the truth. Then it was gone, and he had to wonder if the magatama’s influence had increased his psychic sensitivity somehow or his mind was just playing tricks on him.
“I believe in your innocence,” he announced, louder, more confident than before. “And if you’ll let me, I’ll prove it to the courtroom tomorrow.”
She gave a small smile. “Thank you. For telling me your truth.”
The next morning, Lily Petrichor was waiting for him at the fair entrance. Her hair was tucked into a newsboy cap, and she had a tote bag on one arm that looked distinctly mom-friendish.
“Morning,” Phoenix said when he saw her.
“Mm.” She gave him a tight smile, then reached into her bag and held out a water bottle to him. “Want one before I show you around?”
“Sure.” He surreptitiously inspected the cap for signs of tampering, a habit from college he’d never been able to kick, and took a drink. “I’m waiting for my assistant, but she shouldn’t be too long.”
“She’s still coming?”
Phoenix huffed. “I couldn’t convince her otherwise.”
“Oh, don’t be such a worrywart, Nick!” Maya, holding Pearl with one hand and clasping a sunhat to her head with the other, gave an exasperated huff as she approached. “Come on, we’ve been through worse together. Besides, no way was I going to miss out on a fair with Pearls! It’ll be fine, so long as we stick together.”
“Pardon me if I don’t entirely trust your definition of fine these days,” he muttered.
“Oh, so it’s fine if you eat a glass and metal necklace and have to get emergency surgery to pry out the fragments, but not if I have to stay overnight for a bit of dehydration?”
“I told you that to make you feel better!” Phoenix protested. “Traitor.”
“Yes, and I feel much better now that I get to bully you about your stupid decisions in college!” She gave him a big shit-eating grin, and Phoenix dragged his palm down his face.
“I didn’t know Mr. Nick ate a necklace! Wouldn’t that hurt a lot?” Pearl asked brightly.
“Anyways!” Phoenix tucked the water bottle in his pocket. “Ms. Petrichor, this is my assistant, Maya. And her cousin, Pearl. Maya, Pearls, this is our client’s representative, Lily Petrichor. She’s going to be showing us around the crime scene today. Why don’t we head inside!”
“Um, actually…” The woman raised a rather quiet objection. “I’d be more than willing to show all of you around the festival, but the crime scene itself is rather...well, not suitable for children.”
“Is it bloody?” Pearl asked worriedly.
“You don’t have to worry about that, okay?” She dug around in her bag a moment, pulling out a handful of colored paper rectangles covered in floral script. “Why don’t you and your cousin get something to eat when Mr. Wright and I reach the crime scene? I ended up with all this fair credit since I’m a vendor, but I don’t have much to spend it on, so I’d hate for it to go to waste.”
“We can get food with these…” Maya took one of the papers, turning it upside down and squinting to read, “floral bucks? Heck yeah! Hey Pearl, have you ever tried a funnel cake?”
Pearl gasped in delight. “I wanna try it! I wanna try all the fun foods they have here!”
“It’s decided, then,” Petrichor said with a smile. “The fairgrounds are shaped like a rose, with the crime scene being at the tip of the stem. If we start here, at the south entrance, and move counterclockwise, I can show you all of the relevant attractions in the main area, then drop the girls off at the food court on the way to the crime scene and meet up when we’re done.”
“Got it!” Pearl pushed up one sleeve, looking determined and ready to fight. “If any bad guys try to hurt mystic Maya, I’ll punch them myself!”
“And I’ll defend you against the assault charges,” Phoenix said with a sigh.
Ms. Petrichor blinked. “Aren’t you, like… seven?”
“I’m eight and a half and I’m ready to throw hands with a bitch!”
As much as Lily wanted to hide from the bad memories in this place, she couldn’t help but smile. Mr. Wright had some good friends, and these girls treated him almost like part of their family. Yes, bringing an eight year old to a crime scene was objectively a bad idea no matter how competent that eight year old might be, but it lifted her spirits a bit to see Pearl having fun.
“She’s pretty sheltered, huh,” Lily commented as she watched Pearl’s eyes light up at the sight of one of the fair games. Wright wordlessly passed the girl a handful of bills to try them out. “Can I ask how you know these two?”
He shrugged, adjusting his lapel. “I studied under Mia Fey. Seeing as I don’t have much family myself, I sort of got adopted into the Fey clan after she died and her sister, Maya, needed help. After that, well, they got attached to me. And since Pearl’s mother isn’t great at parenting— well, she framed Maya for murder, but that’s beside the point— Maya and I have been trying to socialize her more in the outside world.”
“And we have a winner!” Behind Wright, a carnival barker was raising Pearl’s hand, and the broken test-your-strength game told the entire story. Holy shit, he hadn’t been kidding about trusting Pearl to defend Maya. “All right, little missy, pick a prize, any prize!”
“I want that one!” Pearl chirped. Wright turned around just in time to gasp in horror at what she’d picked.
“Pearl, what do you have?”
Pearl held up her life sized unicorn plushie triumphantly, making the massive bags of cotton candy dangling around its neck swing dangerously. “A friend!”
“No!” He turned to Maya. “Maya, please tell me you’re not allowing her to keep all of that cotton candy.”
“Aw, you’re such a dad!” She clasped her hands happily. “I’m not telling Pearl anything of the sort.”
“Mayaaaaa,” he groaned. “Fine, but you’re the one who’s going to have to deal with her sugar high. Ms. Petrichor, I’m sorry about my associates.”
“I don’t mind It’s nice to have something to keep my mind off things,” Lily assured him, smiling. She took a breath, one hand going to the Ativan in her pocket. She’d hoped not to need it, but right now it looked like it could go either way. “The, er, photo booth was relevant to your investigation, wasn’t it? I overheard bits and pieces last night.”
“...right.” He eyed her suspiciously. “Are you okay?”
“I think I may need to sit down a moment. Why don’t I keep an eye on the girls, while you inspect the photo booth?” Masking...didn’t come as naturally to her these days, but she gave her best smile anyways. It didn’t work. “I think Aster’s death...may be affecting me a bit more than I thought. Give me a few minutes.”
“Miss Petrichor?” Pearl said, half swallowed by the form of her giant plushie. “You look sad.”
“I know.” It was hard not to be; Lily hadn’t loved Aster romantically, true, but he was like a brother to her. “I just need a minute to grieve a dear friend.”
Phoenix came back from a frustrating conversation with the photo booth attendant just in time to find Pearl winning her third prize. Maya was struggling under the bulk of a massive inflatable sword, and accepted the sequined blanket with the quiet resignation of one who was too busy being happy for someone else to care about such trivial things as vision and the ability to walk without tripping.
“How did it go?” Ms. Petrichor asked.
Phoenix sighed, “Looks like I’ll be able to pick up records of the photos for evidence tomorrow, but they weren’t happy about me poking around. Apparently investigating a murder is bad for business.”
“Well, it’s a good thing you brought Pearly and me, huh?” Maya chirped smugly. “For camouflage!”
“Yeah! Camouflage!” Pearl echoed.
Ms. Petrichor smiled. “Well, I’m glad you two are enjoying it. But it’s probably best not to make a big deal of it; the fair is only continuing because the scene is so far from the main event, and a lot of the vendors are nervous about losing a source of income. So, shall we move on?”
“Aw, but I wanna win more prizes,” Pearl complained. Phoenix tried to suppress a shudder.
“Why don’t we come back later, and you can play one last game, okay?”
“Yeah. I’m getting kinda hungry,” Maya added, taking pity on Phoenix for once. Unfortunately, it... backfired.
“Oh no! Mystic Maya, why didn’t you say anything? We need to find the food court right now! I— I didn’t— I’m sorryyy!”
“Hey, hey, Pearls,” Phoenix said, kneeling down to meet her eyes. He really hoped Ms. Petrichor didn’t question the whole thing, because it would probably take too long to explain the weirdly specific trauma Pearl had gone through during State vs. Engarde. “It’s okay. Maya’s a big girl, all right? Come on, I’ll carry your plushie if you want.”
Pearl hiccuped. “Okay...”
The four of them must have made quite the unusual group; an apologetic teen and a sniffling eight year old girl wearing matching outfits, with Phoenix trying to retain as much dignity as possible while carrying a massive cotton candy unicorn and Lily Petrichor awkwardly walking a few paces behind the rest of them. It was a relief, honestly, when they reached the food tent and found a moderately clean table to set down their prizes.
Lily Petrichor was fiddling uncertainly with the hem of her shirt, and finally took a step forward to address Maya. “It may not be my place, but… have you been seeing anyone after the Engarde trial?”
“Seeing anyone?” Maya blinked in surprise. “I mean, I’m not really in the position for a relationship right now, so— ”
“Oh, no!” She gave a nervous laugh. “I meant like a therapist. I know it can be difficult to cope at times like these, and I figured I might as well give you a recommendation. I’ve got an appointment myself on Thursday, so no judgement here.”
“I’m fine, don’t worry!” Maya said, with a smile that may have always been that forced; Phoenix had only looked close enough to tell after her kidnapping. “Besides, Nick’s been through way worse, and he’s fine! We don’t need therapy!”
“What’s a ther-a-py do?” Pearl asked.
“It’s someone you can talk to about your problems, and they’re trained to listen and help. And you don’t have to feel bad about burdening them, because that’s what you pay them for,” Ms. Petrichor explained. “Sorry, I didn’t mean to cause a ruckus, you just— well, you reminded me of someone.”
“Someone?”
“A girl who wasn’t okay, a long time ago. You wouldn’t know her.” And that was all she said on the topic.
The crime scene itself was...understated, to say the least. A single officer who hardly looked old enough for his uniform, let alone his badge, was patrolling, and only a few scraps of crime scene tape were tied around the booths where the murder had taken place.
Kneeling next to it, though, was a familiar face, and Phoenix gasped when he realized where he knew her from.
“Stephanie O’Scope?”
She grinned, addressing the woman next to Phoenix. “Nice to see you here, Lily. Shame we always seem to meet like this, but this time I’ve got the skills to help with the forensics. Figured it would be a good step towards solving problems around here, y’know?”
“You two know each other?”
“Lily’s a regular of mine; she’s the one who connected me to Amanda when I was accused.” She undid and retied her hair in a complicated motion that only took a few seconds but trapped the majority of it in a tight knot, frowning. “I wish I could be more help in returning the favor, but things aren’t looking good. The victim was kept in stasis, so we don’t have a good estimate for the time of death, and all we’ve got to go on is that the cause of death was blood loss. A single stab to the heart; we’re still looking for the murder weapon.”
“Wait— Steph, isn’t there a conflict of interest if you’re examining the body?”
“Conflict of interest?” Phoenix had to stifle a laugh. “Ms. Petrichor, how much do you know about the current legal system from Ms. Flay?”
“Not much,” she admitted. “Mandy prefers to leave that sort of thing at work.”
“That explains it. Conflict of interest is… well, outdated, to put it kindly. I wouldn’t have been given half of my cases if that rule was still in practice. Besides, in a town like this, it’s more trouble than it’s worth.”
“Huh. The more you know, I guess.” The doctor passed a thin file to Phoenix, held together by a single paperclip. “I’ll have an updated report ready by the second day of the trial, so I’ll keep you posted. You’d better find the truth, got it?”
“Understood.” Phoenix tucked the file under one arm and turned to the crime scene. One half was lined with small clay sculptures, bowls and shot glasses and jewelry in various nature-inspired shapes. A banner shaped like— tulips? Probably tulips— was stretched between two poles, and the cash box was locked tightly and showed no signs of tampering. Everything was quite neatly ordered, price tags and labels in orderly rows.
The neighboring table, however, was clearly a last minute endeavor. The table itself still had the price tag, a clearance sticker neon bright against the sterile plastic, and one leg was at a crooked angle that made it immediately obvious why the thing had been so cheap. Masking tape divided it into three sections, with wood etchings, watercolor paintings, and pressed flowers jostling for space and invading their neighbors.
There was no blood obvious, and the size of the fair made it clear that anything used to wipe it up could be discreetly discarded. Still, a luminol test could definitely reveal new information, if it hadn't already. He got the feeling he wouldn't exactly be permitted to poke around an active crime scene; at least, not while it was still being guarded.
Well, that was all he could do for the time being. Phoenix got to his feet, wincing at the sounds his knees made, and brushed himself off. “Thank you for your time.” He would have liked to meet the other suspects and see why Amanda Flay was being framed for the murder, but he might end up winging it in court tomorrow.
“You know Mandy wouldn’t do it, right?” Lily Petrichor asked seriously, as they were walking away. “She can’t even keep a surprise party secret if confronted.”
“I know. But proving that is going to be difficult.” Difficult, but not impossible. Phoenix sighed, already not looking forward to the taxi ride back to the office with Pearl. Well, he supposed the near-impossible was just another Tuesday for him.