Chapter Text
When Simon woke up, it didn’t take long for him to realize that something was wrong.
Actually, it seemed as though several things were wrong.
Firstly, there was the fact that it seemed like his eyes just wouldn't open, combined with his head, which was throbbing hard. He usually only got a headache like that after a round of heavy drinking, but he hadn't had any drinks at the hotel bar that evening.
Speaking of which… that was something else to add to the growing list of things that felt wrong.
This didn't feel like the hotel bed he had been sleeping in for the past two nights.
To add to his growing confusion, he realized that there was a kind of dull ache in his right wrist. He was quite certain that it hadn’t been aching like that when he had gone back to his hotel room…
There was a strange sort of fog clouding his brain at the moment, and he found that he couldn’t actually remember much of what had happened after his return.
That certainly did nothing to ease the growing unnerving feeling that was currently building up inside of him.
When the fog began lifting just a bit, he noticed a sort of rhythmic beeping sound, and he slowly furrowed his eyebrows when he finally realized where he was.
(I’m… in the hospital…?)
He was finally able to open his eyes, albeit very slowly, and it wasn’t until that moment that he realized something else.
He wasn’t alone in the room.
In fact, there were two others in the room, currently seated in a chair each. One of them was Klavier Gavin, and the other man was…
“... Chief… Prosecutor…?”
That seemed to get the attention of both men, who put down what they had been holding--a book in Edgeworth’s case, and a cellphone in Klavier’s-- and they both gave him a look of relief.
Edgeworth was the first one to speak up as he rose from the chair, moving closer to the bed where Simon was currently laying.
“Prosecutor Blackquill,” he said, his voice a bit fuzzy around the edges from Simon’s point of view.
It looked as though Edgeworth had several things he wanted to say, but he simply pinched the bridge of his nose, seemingly deciding to ask something simple.
“How are you feeling?”
… The question was apparently not as simple as Simon had thought. His head still felt like it was throbbing, and it was hard for him to organize his thoughts.
As a result, it took a while before he was able to answer, and even then, his voice was slow and quiet, like it was taking him a lot of effort to speak.
“... Like shit.”
His blunt answer made Klavier let out a low chuckle from where he was still sitting in a chair, but he didn’t say anything to Simon. Even Edgeworth seemed to find it somewhat amusing, although he didn’t let it go as far as a full-on chuckle.
Edgeworth simply let Simon get his bearings for a while, and when he noticed that he appeared a bit more lucid, he decided to start by asking a question- One which had nagged him ever since Simon was admitted to the hospital.
“... Prosecutor Blackquill,” he called out, wanting to get his attention, since he was clearly still a bit out of it.
“... Hm?”
“... Why did you do it?”
If Simon had had any expectations about what Edgeworth had been about to say, it definitely hadn’t been that. What did he even mean?
“I… I don’t know what you… what you mean, sir,” he finally said after thinking about it for a good minute or two, his eyes closed and the frown back on his forehead. His voice was lacking the usual bite, but his head was still throbbing, and he just felt unwell in general.
“Why did you try to kill yourself?”
That got Simon’s attention, and his eyes snapped open as he regarded the man in front of him. He had known Edgeworth for long enough to know that he would never joke about something like that.
But… he had to be joking. He felt himself chuckle a bit, which only seemed to deepen the worried wrinkles appearing on Edgeworth’s face.
“I wish… you wouldn’t joke about such matters.”
That clearly hadn’t been the response Edgeworth had been looking for, and he let out a low sigh as he regarded the man laying in the hospital bed.
Instead of giving Edgeworth time to say anything though, Simon continued talking.
“I think I would remember if I had--”
He cut himself off there and the frown from earlier was back on his forehead, since he had suddenly realized something.
“... I… I don’t remember.”
This time, it was Klavier’s time to speak up, although he hadn’t moved to stand like Edgeworth had done earlier.
“You… don’t remember?” he questioned, to which Simon nodded. “What’s the last thing you do remember, then?”
Simon closed his eyes again, finding that the light pouring through the windows did nothing for his aching head.
“I… I had just gotten back to my hotel room, after leaving the psychology conference,” he began slowly, trying to make sense of the sort of fuzzy memories.
“I had not gotten a chance to eat anything there, so I ordered some dinner through room service… I heard a knock on the door, and…”
He trailed off there, frustrated at himself and his inability to remember what had happened after that.
“I… do not remember anything after that.”
Edgeworth and Klavier seemed to regard each other in silence, but then Klavier turned to look at Simon again, about to say something when Simon suddenly interrupted him.
“... This dull ache in my wrist… It’s not what I think it is… is it?”
Klavier didn’t answer him directly. Instead, he began filling in the holes of Simon’s memory that he and Edgeworth had managed to gather from their brief investigation. He spoke quietly, probably as an attempt to mask how his voice was trembling ever so slightly.
“It happened last night... “
Klavier had to take a pause there, and whatever he had to say was seemingly hard for him to get out.
“We talked to the bellhop who brought up your food. He told us that he noticed the door was slightly open, and while he would normally never have barged in like that… he said he heard running water from the bathroom.
“After putting your dinner down on the table, he went into the bathroom to turn off the water. But he…”
Klavier felt a lump in his throat as he reached the crux of what had happened, and he found it hard to continue. Still, he knew that he needed to tell Simon what had happened, and he cleared his throat a bit before he spoke again.
“He found you, Simon… sitting in the bathtub, with… with your right wrist slit. You… you were still holding the knife in the other hand.”
Klavier then went on to explain that the bellhop had gotten Simon out of the water, and had used a hotel towel to tie around his wrist, to stop the bleeding. He had used the phone in Simon’s hotel room to call for an ambulance, all of which Simon had no recollection of.
“His quick response is most definitely what saved your life.”
This time, it was Edgeworth who spoke up, pushing his glasses up a bit while he did so.
Simon had about a thousand questions, but he didn’t know where to start, with his head still spinning, and with the added realization that he didn’t actually remember any of what Klavier had described to him.
Could he really have…?
No. There was no way. There simply wasn’t any way.
Simon wasn’t suicidal. He would never have done something like that.
Now that the fog had slowly started to lift itself from his head, he began asking the questions that had been on his mind ever since he had heard Klavier’s account of what had supposedly happened.
“... If the method I chose was slitting my wrist open… then could you perhaps explain why my head has been feeling like I have the world’s worst hangover? And no… I have not been drinking.”
Neither Edgeworth nor Klavier seemed to have a response to that, and Simon utilized the silence to launch another question in their direction.
“Also, this knife that you mentioned…”
“Yes, we were able to see it. It was the same small switchblade that you’ve been seen carrying,” Edgeworth interjected. It was a well known fact that Simon had a habit of carrying a switchblade as means of defending himself in places where he couldn’t bring his sword, after a few people had tried to to show their displeasure about his release from prison.
“... You mean the switchblade that I forgot at home?”
That caused both of them to pause.
“You…?” they said, almost in unison.
“Yes… It is a bit embarrassing, but I had taken it out of the pocket it usually resides in when I went to have my coat cleaned before the conference. When I arrived here, I realized that it was not in my coat.”
“... If you didn’t bring it… then, why was it found in the bathroom?” Klavier inquired, an eyebrow raised as he regarded Simon.
“My blade is quite a common one. If someone wanted to, they could easily procure one identical to mine.”
The inconsistencies seemed to add up in numbers, like the fact that if he truly was suicidal, would he really have ordered food?
The next one was actually found by Edgeworth, who had been silent through most of it, seemingly trying to gather up all of the facts.
His eyes widened ever so slightly when he realized a crucial contradiction, and his voice was low when he suddenly spoke.
“... Oh, we’ve been such foolish fools.”
Simon couldn’t help the smirk that played on his lips at that.
“You have been spending too much time around Prosecutor Von Karma, from the sound of it.”
Klavier raised his eyebrow a bit as his gaze shifted back and forth between Simon and Edgeworth, and he gave Edgeworth a look that clearly meant something like ‘out with it’.
“Look, his right wrist was the one slit, right?” Edgeworth asked, to which Klavier nodded.
“And the knife was found in the opposite hand?”
Another nod, and another raised eyebrow.
And then, it seemed to finally click for Klavier.
“... Holy shit.”
“I can only agree to that statement,” Simon said, glad that the fog was almost completely gone from his mind.
“If I were to slit my wrist, I am quite sure I would have held the knife in my dominant hand. As I happen to be right-handed…"
He trailed off there, since it was clear that his point had come across like he wanted it to.
Klavier and Edgeworth finally seemed to realize that he hadn’t tried to kill himself. But, that still left the startling revelation.
“... This wasn’t an attempted suicide…” Klavier said quietly.
“It was an attempted murder.”