Chapter Text
Bzzt
At that sound, Maya’s attention was drawn to the object vibrating away on a nearby table; her cell phone. Screen-side up, it permitted a quick glance to determine the identity of the caller, though by a slightly unconventional name:
Fran
She picked up the phone.
“Hello?”
“Maya Fey,” was the terse greeting that came through the other end.
“Franziska von Karma,” was the slightly more light-hearted reply.
“I need your help.”
“Oh?” Maya asked, beginning to absentmindedly twirl a strand of hair around her free index finger. “Need to talk to a murder victim or something?”
There was a bit of a conspicuous pause before Fran’s answer came. “…Not quite.”
Before Maya could inquire further, the prosecutor began to explain:
“Recently, I’ve been using a significant other with unusual work hours as an excuse to get out of social gatherings and other… troublesome matters with coworkers.”
Despite the fact that nobody, not least Franziska herself, couldn’t see it, Maya depressed her expression into an unimpressed frown. “Fran, that’s a new level of antisocial.”
“Shut up,” Franziska fired back. “I don’t enjoy social gatherings, alright?! I always feel out of place. It’s easier to lie.”
“Okay, okay, point taken,” Maya replied, backing down from that line of discussion to return to the matter at hand. “So what’s this got to do with me?”
Another pause. “…There will be a New Year’s party at the office the night of. They want me to bring my supposed partner.”
Maya couldn’t help but feel a little confused at that statement. “Why not just say they can’t make it?” Indeed, what exactly was different this time that seemed to have forced Franziska’s hand?
A loud shout through the phone quickly answered Maya’s question:
“Miles Edgeworth!” Maya could practically hear the tightening of Franziska’s glove around the leather of her whip through the phone. “That foolish brother of mine told everyone he was sure my partner would make it! There’s no backing out now! He’s ruined me!”
It wasn’t as if the exact same thing had happened to her, but Maya couldn’t help but be amused a little as Fran’s words called her back to memories of Mia. “Heh. I guess all siblings like to tease each other a bit.” Her curiosity now satiated, she once again re-railed the conversation: “so you want me to be your fake girlfriend at this party?”
“…Please.”
“I can do that, I guess.”
At that point, it would have been fine to simply arrange a meeting-point and time before the party and for the conversation to end right then and there, but there was one thing still rolling around in Maya’s mind. Perhaps it was a product of having been involved with legal proceedings for so long, especially with murders, but there was something Maya didn’t get that had to have been present in this exchange that she wasn’t seeing:
Motive.
“Why me, though?”
“You’re the only person my age I can stand.”
A simple, efficient reply for a… well, not so simple, but efficient prosecutor.
“Wow, that’s high praise coming from you,” Maya teased. “See you on New Year’s, then?”
“…Yes,” Franziska replied, voice low. “Thanks, Maya.”
From the moment she’d hung up the phone, Franziska was overwhelmed with a feeling that what she had just done was a grave mistake. Sure, the idea inevitably carried some degree of risk, but her hand had been forced; she silently cursed the name of her meddling brother again and again as she counted down the hours in her apartment to Maya’s arrival. Risk was something she could tolerate; being an international prosecutor inherently came with a considerable amount of risk, and Franziska did get some thrill out of the excitement of it all.
No, that wasn’t what had her second and third-guessing her decision.
The real reason knocked on the door at 10:43 PM.
“Maya,” Franziska said after opening the door.
“Hi!” Was the spirit medium’s return greeting. “Sorry I’m a little late.”
Indeed, the arrangement had been for her to arrive at 10:30, but very quickly, any memory of time-tabling was swiftly blown away.
Franziska was blown away, too.
Maya was talking, going on about something or other (taking someone else’s shirt?), but Franziska wasn’t paying much attention to that. No, instead, her focus was entirely on the sight in front of her; Maya Fey, not in the acolyte outfit that Franziska had only ever seen her wearing.
The longer she spent looking at her, the more the prosecutor began to realise…
“…You…” She murmured half-mindedly. “You look… beautiful, Maya Fey.”
This seemed to please the young spirit medium, and soon Franziska found herself being whisked out of her apartment, out of the building, and down the street, all whilst arm-in-arm with her new fake girlfriend.
“Ahaha! We look like a real couple already, don’t we?” Maya exclaimed with glee, a big smile on her face.
Franziska did not reply. Indeed, the only sort of response elicited by Maya’s comment was not an utterance of words, but a thought. Perhaps even a prayer to whatever sadistic powers that be. The powers that manned the helm of fate and set her on a course to be wherever she was going. The powers that, through their actions, begged one simple question:
What did I do to deserve this