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“So you’re not just a magician in the performing sense, you’re…” Phoenix started what was inevitably going to be a very strange conversation.
“Yup! I have honest-to-goodness magical powers. Discovered them just a few days ago,” Trucy replied like it was the most normal thing in the world.
“Really? How does it work?!” Maya piped up excitedly, leaning forward in her seat to listen more carefully.
“Well, I’m not even fully sure myself yet…” Trucy started, a little sheepish. “But I think how it works is that I can manipulate energy, in all different forms and ways.”
“Even in people’s bodies?!” Maya leaned even further forward, excitement sparkling in her eyes.
“Mhm! Remember when you mysteriously flipped upside down in the shower yesterday, Daddy?”
Pain rolled around Phoenix’s head at the memory, and dread settled in his stomach at the realisation. “Uh… yes?”
“Well, that may or may not have been the result of some slightly reckless experimentation,” came Trucy’s slightly embarrassed explanation.
“I do not believe half of what I do see, let alone what I don’t, so I’m having great difficulty accepting what you’re telling us as true.”
Phoenix had all but forgotten that Edgeworth was in the room until his low, unconvinced voice entered the air.
“Oh yeah?” Maya challenged, putting her hands on her hips. “Well, how about she does a little demonstration on you? I bet you’d believe it then!” The dramatic point she was now doing was not unlike the gesture Phoenix himself did in court often enough. Edgeworth too, actually.
“Okay, Maya, that’s a little unnecessary,” Phoenix said, interrupting Edgeworth’s about-to-be response placatorily. “Besides, Trucy isn’t the type of person to do something like that to someone.”
“Actually...”
Phoenix did not like the way his daughter slowly crossed her arms and smiled deviously as she began to speak.
“I think that’s an excellent idea. What should we have him do?”
Edgeworth did not seem in the least bit disturbed by all this, but Phoenix gulped loudly.
He’d touched his Magatama when Trucy had answered his question earlier; no psyche-locks.
“Whatever it is, it should be so out-of-character that you would never, ever see him do it of his own accord.” Maya stroked an invisible beard as she closed her eyes in deep thought. “Like…singing and dancing!”
“That’s perfect!” Trucy beamed, her voice coming out somewhere between an excited shout and an evil laugh. “What shall he sing for us…” Trucy mimicked Maya’s ponderous mannerisms as she, too, began to think.
Phoenix hoped to whatever powers that be (perhaps the Flying Spaghetti Monster) that Trucy wouldn’t remember that he and her had gone to see a performance of Fiddler on the Roof just the other day, which had a number of songs that were likely perfect for their dubious intentions.
But by the looks of the lightbulb that suddenly appeared over her head after only a moment or two, it seemed as though his hopes were in vain.
“Oh! I know just the thing!” Trucy exclaimed, turning to face Edgeworth and cracking her knuckles.
“Look; I really shouldn’t even be entertaining this rather silly idea, but let me lay it out plainly so we can discuss more… constructive matters: magical energy-manipulation is impossibLE-”
Edgeworth had begun to try to shut down the wild tomfoolery of Trucy and Maya, sounding a bit agitated as he did so, but was unable to finish as Trucy lifted up her hands and clenched them a little, rendering him wide-eyed and as stiff as an ironing board.
It was real. Trucy’s ‘silly’ magical powers were real.
And Miles Edgeworth, whether he liked it or not, was about to start singing and dancing.
“What’s that? I’m afraid I didn’t hear that right. Could you repeat it to me?” The puppetmaster raised a white-gloved hand to her ear (leaving the other to maintain her iron grip over her puppet) as she turned her head and spoke in a playfully mocking tone.
Edgeworth merely croaked in response, being the only thing he could do at that moment, given his circumstances.
“Ah, well. Mustn't have been important,” Trucy said pseudo-disappointedly.
Maya, on the other hand, was practically vibrating with very genuine excitement and repressed laughter as Trucy sent Edgeworth shooting out of his chair and onto his feet in one big awkward motion.
“I don’t exactly have any practice clocked in with this, besides Daddy’s little shower incident, so don’t expect it to be all that great,” Trucy disclaimed as she walked the likely terrified Edgeworth (though he was incapable of expressing it) to the centre of the room.
Once he had taken his place, Trucy had him turn to face the trio that was his audience (including Trucy herself) and said unto him:
“Now, my little puppet: dance!”
And with a swish of her hands, it began.
Well, it didn’t exactly begin begin; Edgeworth did not immediately begin to sing nor dance, but Phoenix was certainly not used to the kind of words he was hearing come out of Edgeworth’s mouth, and definitely not in that style. It wasn’t (yet) singing, but it wasn’t ordinary speech, either. He was speaking the introduction to the song If I Were a Rich Man, and Trucy was making him do all manner of melodramatic gestures and facial expressions.
Maya was right: it was obscenely out of character, and Phoenix (or part of him, anyway) was having a hard time believing that it was, indeed, Edgeworth doing what he was doing, albeit unwillingly.
And it was actually pretty funny.
Maya seemed to think so, anyway. She was giggling like a madwoman as she watched the spectacle unfold, unable to restrain herself any longer. Midway through the intro, however, she suddenly bolted upright in her seat and waved her hands at Trucy, spouting off “waitwaitwaitwaitwaitwait” in an excited rush.
“What is it, Maya?” Trucy held her hands still to freeze Edgeworth in place and turned to her partner-in-crime, sensing that another idea was at hand.
“Lemme whisper it to you.” Maya lowered her voice a little as she sneaked up and off of her seat on the couch to move to the side of Trucy’s head, who obliged by turning it to better hear her companion. Trucy snickered here and there with increasing intensity as Maya explained whatever harebrained scheme she’d cooked up in that brain of hers.
Once Maya had finished, Trucy turned to Maya to whisper something back. Phoenix didn’t catch all of it, but he did manage to hear the odd snippet of what his daughter was saying, including “… never met… heard a lot about… quite the introduction!”
Maya’s response was to giggle as Trucy got up and made her way over to Edgeworth’s frozen figure, her hands still up as to keep him that way. She whispered something in his ear briefly before moving her own to hear his reply, which only seemed to be one or two words long. Then, she posed a second question to him. This time, Edgeworth seemed hesitant to answer, but given his predicament, he likely realised that he would only be doing himself a disservice by not cooperating. Thus, he offered a reply; this one more like a full sentence.
With that, Trucy returned to her seat, pulled out her cell phone from her pocket, and dialed it single-handedly (literally). The phone began to ring and she quickly brought it to her ear. It only took a couple of seconds for the recipient of the call to answer it, and the following conversation took place:
“Hello? Is this Franziska von Karma, the prosecutor?” Trucy spilled out in a faux-panicked, hurried tone.
…
“My name is Trucy Wright, daughter of Phoenix Wright. You need to come down to the Wright Anything Agency right away; something has happened to Mr. Edgeworth!”
…
“I don’t know! He wandered in here as if in a trance, babbling incoherently and acting very, very strangely! It’s like he’s been possessed!”
…
“Yes! I know him! I’ve known him for some time! Oh, please, you have to believe me; he’s never done things like this before, you need to get here as fast as possible!”
…
“Thank you so much! We’re keeping a close eye on him and not letting him out of our sight, so he’ll be okay until you get here! See you soon!”
She hung up the phone.
“You called Franziska von Karma down here?!” Phoenix finally managed to snap out of his bewildered reverie long enough to exclaim to his daughter, who clearly didn't know what she was getting herself into.
“Yep!” Came the cheeky reply.
“Lady von Whippingberg?!?!”
“Uh… yes?”
Oh yeah, Phoenix hadn’t told her the story behind that one. That would have to wait, though, because- at present- the room’s acoustics were completely occupied by Maya, who was laughing her Magatama off. This was most certainly not funny; everybody in this room was almost certainly doomed to be whipped to the point of unconsciousness now.
“Now, while we wait for Ms. von Karma to arrive,” Trucy said in a rather stately fashion. “Let us return to our entertainment.”
Sure enough, with a swish of the puppetmaster's hands, Edgeworth instantly reanimated, returning immediately to his theatrics. A few more seconds went by as he recited the rest of the song’s introduction word-for-word, and Phoenix was actually quite stunned that Trucy had memorised all the words after just a single viewing of the original play. Had she been preparing for this?
And then, the first lyrics:
“If I were a rich man, igga digga vidda digga bigga ooga digga dum…”
Phoenix nearly choked on a suppressed snort-laugh as he heard the strangest possible sounds come out of Miles Edgeworth’s mouth. Was it onomatopoeia? Probably not, but what did it matter? It was hilarious. Maya certainly thought so, judging from her raucous laughter and her fervent clutching at her belly. Trucy smiled and chuckled a little, but remained focused on the task at hand.
“All day long, I’d biddy biddy bum if I were a wealthy man!”
Trucy had Edgeworth’s hands above his head, his eyes largely closed, his face relaxed and smiling, and his legs lightly prancing around as he sang. The movements and expressions were smooth enough to be realistic, but janky enough for one to tell that he was being manipulated somehow.
“Are you thinking what I’m thinking?” Maya interrupted the show again to say to her assistant-in-felony in a cheeky voice that was getting to be all too familiar as Edgeworth’s possessed voice shrieked “ca-QUACK, GOBBLE GOBBLE GOBBLE, GOBBLE-GOOO, GRBLGRBLGRBLGRBL” in the background.
“Oh, I think I do.”
Phoenix could only wonder what that could mean, and how much more of this madness he could handle all at once.
Now Edgeworth was doing an exaggerated mock-sigh. His eyes were half-closed, his shoulders sagged, and his mouth drooped open. The combination of it all induced Maya to laugh even harder, Trucy to chuckle a little, and Phoenix to snort; unable to hide his own amusement any longer.
Edgeworth was still for a moment as Trucy gave herself a few seconds to recover. Soon enough, though, her hands were back at it and thus so was Edgeworth.
“If I were a rich man, igga digga gutha bootha dugga digga digga thum…” The puppet’s voice went quieter and higher, which only fueled the flames of Phoenix’s poorly suppressed laughter- being that it was a sound he was not at all used to, and the current circumstances only made it more amusing. Trucy brought up Edgeworth’s hands to just above his collarbone (how long had they been at his side? Shit, Phoenix was missing too much of the show) and balled them into loose fists. His eyes returned to being closed and he smiled again as he shimmied his upper body and arms to the beat of the music. “All day long, I’d biddy biddy bum…” he stopped moving abruptly on the “bum” before continuing on. “…if I were a wealthy man!”
Phoenix duly took note of the surprisingly rather impressive boom of Edgeworth’s voice as it rose to sing ‘man’. He could have easily become a singer if he needed another job; he actually sounded pretty good. Phoenix would have to egg him on to sing on his own now and then.
“I wouldn’t have to work hard, igga digga digga digga digga digga digga dum…” By this point, Phoenix’s choked laughter had subsided in favour of genuine awe. Edgeworth’s singing and dancing was a little robotic, but that was just because Trucy was windmilling him about against his will. Phoenix was starting to think that Edgeworth could actually be a great singer if he applied himself on his own, and even this was turning out to be more entertaining than funny now.
But all of that awe and amazement quickly disappeared when Edgeworth sang this line:
“I’d see my wife, my Phoenix, looking like a rich man’s wife; with a proper double chin!”
Maya had probably never laughed so hard in her life, and Phoenix had probably not felt so hot in his. He couldn’t tell what she found so funny: Edgeworth with a spouse, Edgeworth married to Phoenix, Phoenix married to Edgeworth, Phoenix being referred to as a ‘rich man’s wife’ (or ‘wife’ at all, really), or Phoenix with a double chin, but it was making her damn near roll right off the couch.
Phoenix watched in complete silence as Edgeworth moved through the rest of the song as though absolutely nothing had happened whatsoever. Of course, it wasn’t like he could’ve reacted to it even if he wanted to; Trucy’s grip was iron, but there was (ignoring the fact that Phoenix had been referred to as a ‘wife’) something about Miles Edgeworth casually and passionately referring to his Phoenix as his spouse that sent both shivers down Phoenix’s spine and butterflies a-fluttering in his stomach.
Perhaps, under much different circumstances, a phrase with such a meaning as that wouldn’t have been entirely unwelcome…
“Lord, who made the lion and the lamb…”
Everyone watched Edgeworth intently as he drew to the conclusion of the song. Phoenix could have sworn he felt a distant thumping in the floor.
“You decreed I should be what I am.”
Now the thumping was getting truly strong and distinct; it sounded like heavy, percussive footsteps.
“Would it spoil some vast eternal plaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaan…”
One of Edgeworth’s hands was outstretched dramatically, the other rested on his jabot as his face was strained in melodrama.
“If… I were…”
The footsteps were drawing even nearer, almost upon them.
“A wealthy…”
Footsteps up the hall. Edgeworth opened his eyes at last and spread his arms wide.
“MAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAN!”
Phoenix could practically hear the music burst in his head as Edgeworth concluded. It stopped abruptly, though, when the front door to the agency flew open.
“WHERE IS he…”
Of all the ways to reunite with Franziska von Karma after all these many years, watching her intense, almost angry expression quickly fade into the most baffled face he’d ever seen her make as her loud, demanding voice trailed off weakly was not how Phoenix ever expected it to happen.
But here they were.
And now, it seemed, was the time for Trucy to lose her marbles much like Maya had.
She laughed intensely along with her fellow evildoer, dropping her arms to her waist as she reacted to Franziska’s unceremonious entrance. As a result, Edgeworth finally got control of himself again, and he wasted no time whipping around to shout at his sister: “Run! Get out of here! Save yourself!”
For (probably) the first time in her life, Franziska did exactly as she was told without a moment’s hesitation; wheeling about in an instant to dash away. However, though von Karma was quick, young Trucy was quicker, and Franziska didn’t get more than a step in before she was ironclad in Trucy’s grasp.
“Oh, no. You’re not getting away that easily. It’s time you found out why I really called you here.”
Franziska slowly turned around and re-entered the room, a wide-eyed expression of surprise plastered on her face; the sudden inability to move likely caught her off guard.
And then, like a switch had been thrown, she began to dance.
“If I were a rich man, igga digga digga booga dugga digga dugga dum…” Like Edgeworth before her, her eyes were closed, and her torso swayed lightly from side to side.
“All day long, I’d biddy biddy bum if I were a wealthy man!”
Edgeworth, now free of Trucy’s dancing tyranny, opted to sit in a nearby chair and join the audience, likely aware by now of the futility in trying to flee, and by the funny look emerging on his face, it looked like he was now enjoying himself as well.
“I wouldn’t have to work hard, igga dugga digga dooga digga dugga dugga dum …”
“Wait!” Maya was now laughing so hard that all she made were little choppy wheezes, and she had to struggle with all her might to be able to speak as her face was all scrunched up and her cheeks profaned with tears. “Who’s… gonna… be her… rich man’s wife?”
“If I were a biddy biddy rich idle diddle didle didle man!”
Trucy responded to Maya with another devious grin, but not a single word, leaving everyone to wonder what cruel joke she had in store for Franziska as she’d had for Edgeworth.
Over the next few moments or so, Phoenix watched as Franziska’s singing and dancing noticeably improved. Her motions became more fluid, appearing more natural and less robotic, and she began doing more complex movements that Edgeworth had not, including moving her waist independently of her hips, and her head side to side while keeping it level. Her voice (a smooth, rich alto) also improved, making use of an even and well-timed vibrato. Trucy was getting really good at this.
Phoenix turned his head to offer his daughter a semi-joking compliment, but blinked in confusion when he was met with a sight he was not expecting:
Trucy’s arms weren’t up and conducting anymore.
Instead, they were folded limply in her lap. Her eyes were wide and her mouth agape as she stared forward sedentarily. Phoenix looked back and forth between Franziska and Trucy a few times before the realisation finally hit him.
Oh.
Phoenix’s own eyes went wide as he, too, began to stare forward in awe. The amusing revelation that Franziska had both seen Fiddler on the Roof and had memorised the lyrics to the song, and was secretly (well, not so secretly anymore) an immensely talented singer and dancer, was swept away by the sheer impressiveness of the latter. Phoenix was reminded of how stunning Edgeworth’s own singing voice had been, even under Trucy’s puppeteering. He would’ve called it a familial trait if the two were actually blood relatives.
Even Maya’s laughter died away as she became enraptured by Franziska’s performance, and she soon joined the crowd of wide-eyed, awe-stricken onlookers. It didn’t seem like she’d realised what was going on (and likely wouldn’t, given how intensely her gaze was fixed to the sight in front of her), but by the slight upturning of her mouth and the light dusting of pink of her cheeks, Phoenix gathered that something else besides mere awe was going on behind the scenes in her mind.
But it didn’t last all that long, as Franziska had reached the line:
“I’d see my wife, my Maya, looking like a rich man’s wife: with a proper double chin!” Came the line as Franziska swished her hand vaguely towards Maya, and lifted her head a bit as her body swayed to the side.
Maya’s eyes went yet wider and her cheeks yet redder as she made an awkward chortling sound. She turned to face Trucy, likely to give her some ‘oh, you’ comment, but when she saw Trucy’s lack of movement and resting hands, as well as her expression (which looked almost as surprised as Maya’s was), Maya’s jaw smashed the floor and her cheeks crossed the threshold to beetroot; her eyes becoming as wide as pie pans before she turned back to look at Franziska.
“Supervising meals to her heart’s delight!”
The next (and, subsequently, last) one to discover the truth was Edgeworth. Likely noticing the way the movement in the audience had come and then died off, he looked over towards the others; first at Maya, then at Trucy. When he saw the inevitable, he blinked forcefully, and when his eyes re-opened, his eyebrows came right up with them as they widened considerably. He looked up at Franziska and the corner of his mouth upturned, completing a look that just screamed ‘well, I’ll be’. Like everyone else, he seemed thoroughly impressed by his sister’s hidden talents, and there was much pride in his face as he watched on.
“I’d see her putting on airs and strutting like a peacock. Oy! What a happy mood she's in! Screaming at the servants day and night: ‘bring me my burgers! Burgers! BURGERS!’”
Franziska’s eyes opened for a moment to stare into the distance as she did her comical imitation of Maya, which elicited a slight chuckle from the latter, but Phoenix was left to wonder (and judging from her expression, Maya was too): how did Franziska know that Maya liked burgers so much? Had she found out from Edgeworth? Even if that were true, none of them knew that, so even if they hadn’t realised what was up from Trucy’s lack of conducting, that would have been a dead giveaway.
But Franziska didn’t realise her slip-up whatsoever as she continued with just as much zeal as before: “the most important men in town will come to fawn on me!”
It seemed that Franziska had gotten so thoroughly in the zone that she’d entirely forgotten that there were other people in the room, which was the only logical explanation for how passionately she performed her song.
“They will ask me to advise them, like a Solomon the Wise. ‘If you please, von Karma.’ ‘Pardon me, von Karma.’”
Her hands moved all over as she acted out these ‘most important men in town’, and Phoenix’s sentiments went from ‘wow’ to ‘holy shit ’ as she really got into it, her voice peaking like Edgeworth’s had at the same point in the song, but with tenfold more fiery fervour than her brother as she gave out with all her might:
“Posing problems that would cross a rabbi’s eyes! Ba-boy! Boy! Boy! Ba-boy! Boy Boy! A-BOOOOOOOOOOOOY!”
Her voice trumpeted right across the room, and it could be heard ringing off the walls as the musical accompaniment again played in Phoenix’s head. He’d have to check later and be sure she hadn’t rattled the windowpanes to pieces.
“And it won’t make one bit of difference if I answer right or wrong!”
The comedic, joke-y atmosphere of the room had long since faded as everyone was content to be thoroughly entertained by Franziska, who still didn’t seem to realise that Trucy was no longer manipulating her as she continued her performance.
But it all came to an abrupt, anticlimactic end as she sang the line:
“When you’re rich, they think you really know…”
Franziska made the mistake of opening her eyes to look at what she thought was an invisible audience, and lost all the strength in her voice when she finally realised that it was not so. Now it was her turn for her eyes to go wide, and Phoenix could see her cheeks grow redder with each passing second, as if someone had set fire to the inside of her mouth. Her hands lowered down and all the confidence fled from her shoulders as she hunched over a bit.
“U-um… I… Uh…” was all she could muster, her voice a shaky shadow of its former self, sounding some 15 years younger than it really was.
Once Franziska had trailed off into silence, a new sound came to occupy the empty space: clapping. Everyone turned to look at Maya, who clapped loudly in solitude. Her face was just as red as before, but now she had a big smile on her face, which broke to say; “bravo! Bravissimo!”
Franziska replied with a sound that was not unlike a mouse squeaking as her head sank into her shoulders a bit. The intense red in her face cheeks spread over her entire head. She looked hot enough to warrant spontaneous combustion at any second.
And then she turned and bolted out the door and down the hall.
Trucy just blinked to recalibrate her brain, but before she had any idea of what had just happened, Franziska was gone.
Phoenix looked over at Maya, who seemed just as baffled as Trucy. He felt an encouraging smile grow on his face as she met his gaze. “Go get ‘em, tiger.”
Maya awkwardly got to her feet and began to chase after Franziska, not seeming exactly sure as to what she was going to do if she caught her.
“Well, that was something,” said Edgeworth, leaning back in his chair and crossing his arms.
“Yeah, no kidding,” Phoenix replied, watching Maya disappear out the door. “Hey, can I ask you something?” He turned to look at the prosecutor.
“Hm?” Edgeworth met his gaze, inquisitively.
“That line… you know, the one about being the ‘rich man’s wife’…” Phoenix did air quotes to try and hide how uncertain his voice and face were. “Was there… any truth to that?”
“D-don’t be ridiculous, Wright,” Edgeworth frowned a bit. “That was just your mischievous daughter talking.”
Phoenix gave a sheepish smile. “Of course,” he concluded as he turned to look back out at the now open door to the agency.
But deep down, he knew something wasn’t entirely truthful about that statement, even without touching his Magatama.
Because in that moment, when Edgeworth had sung that line, Phoenix could have sworn he’d heard the tiniest hint of vibrato in his voice.