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The sun rolled across the sky with placid ease, lazily shining its scorching rays upon the parched state of Japanifornia. The heat wave that had plagued the country for the last couple of weeks continued to sear it with unrelenting tenacity. It left the asphalt highways sizzling and displaying that ever-deceiving mirage of a large body of water on the road ahead that flees when approached, always out of reach; the flora waving the wilting, yellowing leaves as signal flags in silent pleas for hydration; and people in duress as the threat of a severe heat stroke always loomed overhead.
Therefore, a certain group of legal experts investigating a murder outdoors in this swelter learned to count their blessings.
And they did. Three.
One — their expertise guaranteed that the investigation was finished swiftly.
Two — the nearby restaurant “Jours passés” offered a wholesale discount on milkshakes, cold and ready to reinvigorate.
Three — several parasols cast an invaluable, inviting shade over the café’s terrace.
It was located behind the eatery on an ivory coloured tile platform, which carried a simple arrangement of two straight rows of several tables and chairs overlooking a small clearing with an elegant magenta wisteria grove.
Surrounding the deck was a chest-high fence constructed of simple straight metallic bars and a coarse mesh, cut from blackened steel — the same material that the frames of terrace’s furniture were made from; supplemented with lumber of dark brown cypress serving as seats, backrests and surface tops.
Each table held a uniform kit of yellow laminated menu, white porcelain spice shakers and napkin holders, and that essential parasol in one of the primary colours. Nearly every table today was taken by groups of people exploiting the special offer — families, friends and work colleagues.
Thanks to the aforementioned three boons, those investigators could finally ignore the torrid heat rays under a burgundy umbrella, relax and reminisce of colder days of their past.
“… and when Mr Wright found a bloodstain under the metal cover of the Time Keeper, the butler was done for — cornered and with no choice but to confess!” Athena Cykes enthusiastically wrapped up the retelling of a case from last September by smacking the table top. Her grand gestures illustrating the story nearly knocked over the nearby stand holding their coats and capes — all set aside to let a light breeze cool bare skin. Athena herself had removed her yellow bolero jacket, Widget and its accompanying glove.
“So the butler really did it. It sounds almost cliché when I say it out loud...” Apollo Justice spoke up only after she had finished. He answered the call of duty in the faraway Kingdom of Khura’in at the time of the case, so his tablemates sought to fill him in on that bizarre trial. “I have to admit — while the premise of that plan is ridiculous, he made it look very convincing. It must’ve cost him a fortune!”
“Yeah, he really had us fooled with the two wedding receptions. It was quite an exorbitant investment, financially speaking,” Ema Skye added, lazily cooling herself with a makeshift newspaper fan as setting aside her forensics lab coat wasn’t enough. “And it almost paid off! To think that we only discovered it due to a single bouquet of flowers...”
“It really was a great case of misdirection. But I bet if I was in Ellen’s place, I would have seen right through it! I’ve done so much of it for my tricks that I’ve got a trained eye for it now!” Trucy Wright boasted. Despite lacking her signature top hat and cape — thus making her stature shorter — her presence remained as exuberant as ever.
She received an annoyed grunt from the other side of the table as a response.
“So you could’ve helped Mr Wright in the investigation, but chose to haunt me instead…” Athena grumbled.
“I had full confidence in Daddy — he had it under control even without me. And remember, you agreed to help voluntarily and I had to make sure you earn your pay!” Trucy responded without a second thought as she shot the lawyer a stern glare. Athena avoided it, mumbling under her breath something about pain and suffering.
“So Athena once again wished to evade her duties?”
That sudden, booming question heralded the expansion of their group to a quintet.
Simon Blackquill — appearing unusually bright without his traditional surcoat and bar jacket — steadily approached them, carrying a large tray with four milkshakes and carefully set it down. It had barely touched the table before Athena snatched the largest one and three drinking straws and smacked them down in front of Apollo with a wide grin.
Simon spared her an exasperated look before calmly distributing the rest among his tablemates. He then sat down, deeply sighed, wiped the sweat from his forehead with the back of his hand and took a sip of his vanilla shake.
“However, I must concur. The Sprocket trial was a complete bedlam. If I hadn’t been following an essential lead into the Phantom investigation, I might have taken up the chief prosecutor’s offer to arraign the bride. I could’ve used some levity that week.”
“No offence, Prosecutor Blackquill, but I’m so glad you didn’t take it. It was an opportunity for me to finally work with Chief Prosecutor Edgeworth in an official capacity!” Ema interjected.
“He had taken no cases ever since his promotion, save for that emergency one. I was so worried thinking I had missed my chance, so that trial was a godsend! Working with him again was amazing! His intellect astounded, his logic was impeccable, and his professionalism was so refreshing compared to the fop’s frivolity and prosecutor Sahdmadhi’s austerity…” She swooned with a dreamy, glazed look in her eyes, lazily stirring the chocolate milkshake in her hand with a straw.
“Am I not professional enough for you now, detective?” Simon saw an opportunity for some teasing and couldn’t resist taking it. Ema shook her head — partially to deny the accusation, partially to refocus on her tablemates.
“No, of course not, but there’s something about his presence that says ‘If I think it’s worth doing, it’s worth doing right.’ You’ve also worked with him, surely you know what I mean?”
Simon chuckled.
“While I’m not nearly as infatuated with him as you are, detective, I’ll also agree that the Chief Prosecutor did a remarkable job –— please, Ms Skyence, don’t fling that Snackoo, we’re in a public establishment — as always. I couldn’t have handled it better myself. There’s a good reason why he occupies such a prestigious position.”
He again chortled at Ema’s death glare — her flushed cheeks still betrayed her, displaying the accuracy of Simon’s off-handed joke — and took another swig of his drink.
“I especially commended his efforts in opposing Wright-dono’s ridiculous claim that time travel actually existed. What absolute claptrap! Is there no bluff too preposterous for that man?”
Apollo had attentively followed their conversation, so he was completely blindsided by Athena trying to sneak some milkshake foam under his nose with her straw. It worked, and he sneezed like a kitten, causing her to giggle in delight. She dodged his scowl by turning towards Blackquill.
“Wait, so you don’t believe in time travel, Simon?
“No.”
“What? You’ve never, ever wanted to travel back in time to ‘the good old days?’”
“Not really, no.”
Trucy set down her glass of blueberry shake — now half-full — on the table and tapped her chin in contemplation.
“Huh. I always imagined you’d like to meet someone like Oda Nobunaga — the man who unified Japan — or a great samurai warrior who inspired you! Or maybe even participate in a great samurai battle, like … what was that one called? The Battle of Shiroyama?”
Confusion flashed in Simon’s furrowed brow for just a moment, but it quickly gave way to one of his trademark sly smirks.
“Like I said, not really. Firstly, I’ve always found Tokugawa Ieyasu more interesting. Secondly, I believe it would feel rather jarring to aid the samurai, turn the tide of the battle and then return to the present and see their class as a significant part of the Japanese Self-Defence Forces.”
“If I recall my Japanese history correctly,” Ema again chipped in, “you’d be more likely to just see five hundred and one samurai on the casualty list. Shiroyama was less of an equal battle and more of a last stand, tactically speaking. As skilled as you are, Prosecutor, it’d take more than one more man in that slaughter for samurai to win.”
“That is woefully correct. By the time their armies met on that mountain, the samurai days were already counted for. At the very least, I would be dying for a cause worth dying for. Surely it’s the death most anyone would aspire to?”
“Oh. I didn't know how that battle turned out. I only remember hearing its name in the history class...” Trucy sheepishly admitted.
Now it was time for Apollo’s brow to furrow.
“I don’t think ‘dying for an archaic warrior caste’ is quite worth it, Prosecutor Blackquill. I think we can all agree that it’s best to…”
“Die spectacularly on a stage!” Trucy interrupted him with a flourish of her hand.
“Die in a way that benefits mankind!” Ema proclaimed, striking the air with her straw.
“Not die at all!” Athena cheered, striking her own palm.
Exasperation poured out of Apollo’s next exhale, so thick and heavy that he had to rest his head on his palms, silently praying that the antics of these four won’t be the death of him.
“… I was about to say ‘die peacefully and painlessly in bed’, but it looks like no one agrees with me.”
Simon smirked once again.
“Seemingly so, Justice-dono. Regardless, I simply believe that what’s done is done. You can’t change the past, for better and for worse. It’s more fructuous to focus your attention on the present and the future, as it is something one can actually influence.”
“That is very rational, Mr Blackquill!” Trucy chimed in, flashing her dazzling performer’s smile.
It quickly dimmed to merely subdued. “And extremely boring. Personally, I always wanted to travel back to the late 19th century. It’s the time where the history of magic as we know it was made! No more was magic a charlatan’s game on a shady street corner, but a real performance on a theatrical stage! Imagine seeing the original shows of the greats like Jean-Eugene Robert-Houdin and Harry Houdini! Oh, to be the assistant in performing ‘Second Sight’ or ‘Metamorphosis’… ”
A sparkle of joy glistened in her eye just imagining the possibility.
“As long as it doesn’t inspire you to recreate them with us as the guinea pi — I mean, assistants, I wouldn’t mind seeing them as well.” Apollo had to admit. Helping her perform was tiring, but that genuine curiosity for all things magical always persisted in the back of his mind. Must be those Gramarye genes keeping his interest alive.
“Of course not, Polly, don’t be silly! While those tricks were revolutionary for their time, by modern standards they’re old hat. To really stand out, I must innovate! There’ll always be something new and exciting in my repertoire! It’s my duty as the heir to the Gramarye name!”
If there ever was such a thing as a determined sip, she took one before turning to Athena.
“So, what about you? Anywhere you’d like to time travel to?”
Mischief was still on Athena’s mind, this time trying to trace Apollo’s earlobe with one of the straws, but the question snapped her out of it, painting her cheeks a light crimson.
“Actually,” she began by pointing the straw at her tablemates like a conductor’s baton, “there’s something you all haven’t considered yet — what about travelling to the future? I would love to see the wonders of tomorrow!”
Her eyes seemed alight with passion and curiosity; voice crackling with excitement as she counted the down the possibilities, “Imagine seeing the cool tech GYAXA will have invented for space exploration, how fancy and futuristic all of our offices will look, and how analytical psychology will have revolutionised the legal system! That’s way more exciting! And—”
There must’ve been something odd about her friends’ curious faces, because one look at them was all it took for her to go silent in a flash. That passionate fire in her core was snuffed out, stymieing the source of her fervent body language. She seemed to shrink as her shoulders sagged, gaze lowered and darkened ever so slightly before she took a trembling breath. When she found strength to continue, the words were barely louder than a whisper.
“Yeah, I know what you’re wondering — don’t I want to go back to my childhood and stop the Phantom? I— I don’t know,” she stammered. “Of course, there are several things I’d like to change, but… So much might go wrong! I could become a completely different person. Could I even recognize myself afterwards? Would I even meet every one of you? Would— I just … don’t know.”
Her palm was enveloped by a touch gentler than the zephyr flowing through the terrace. Then it squeezed with careful, comforting grace. She raised her head to see Apollo having moved his chair right next to her, reservedly smiling with compassion crinkling his eyes. She returned the smile and rested her head on his shoulder for but a moment, before gesturing towards their untouched strawberry shake.
Ema nodded in a silent understanding, seeing that Athena had finished, and took initiative in the conversation.
“As for me, I think I’ll have to agree with Prosecutor Blackquill. With such complex ideas, I always consider the hard science facts and opinions of experts before forming my own.
“The most prevalent theory in the scientific community is that time is linear, with no way to travel back. The few models of space-time that present the possibility of going back in time, such as wormholes and closed time-like curves, are completely theoretical, with no practical plausibility. Plus, even if it was possible, the causality problems such as temporal paradoxes would severely limit the possibilities of what could be accomplished. Additionally, applying the Fermi paradox to time travel has worked so far — if it exists, why haven’t we been visited by people from the future? Overall, it’s extremely unlikely that time travelling backwards in time is possible.
“As for travelling to the future, the theory of special relativity does dictate that time passes slower near objects with a strong gravity field. Especially evident in extreme examples — someone near the edge of a black hole would experience years pass in a matter of hours, thanks to time dilation. But again, it’s all completely theoretical, since we would have to find a way to survive near a black hole in the first place. So I would dare to say that time travelling is almost certainly unfeasible.”
The table turned quiet for a few seconds, save for the slurping of straws, as Ema quenched her parched throat with the last drops of her shake after that monologue. After setting the glass down, she rested her head on her palm, wistfully gazing in the distance.
“Still, I’d give anything for all those facts and experts to be wrong and I could see Mom and Dad one more time. I miss them.” Ema topped it off with a weary sigh.
Her sight refocused shortly after, and shame seemed to creep in her voice.
“I know, I know, how hypocritical after my assessment — don’t mind my careless wishful thinking.”
Her tablemates disagreed. Trucy put a reassuring hand on her shoulder.
“Nothing careless about that. To once again see the ones you love, but have passed on is nothing to be ashamed about. Everyone gets those longing feelings from time to time. I’m sure none of us would judge you.”
Simon sagely nodded his head… and then jolted in surprise as a loud clink and a storm of coughing, gagging and droplets of a milkshake struck from the opposite side of the table. No one had expected hurricane Athena.
Thankfully, Apollo was already working on helping it, swiftly striking her between the shoulder blades.
“Why did you rush to drink it? It’s not like I was going to drink it all!” he whined.
“You clumsy dolt…” Simon mumbled under his breath. Thankfully, it proved just the thing to lighten Ema’s mood as she seemed to barely hold back a giggle. Trucy just sighed, picking up the spilt glass and using a couple of napkins to clean up the table.
“Aaah. Just a harmless competition to keep you on your toes, cielo! ” Athena calmed her breathing, then instantly bounced back to her normal cheerful self.
“How was that harmless? You choked! And I’m pretty sure that competition was hardly fair! Having two straws is cheating!”
He waved towards Ema as a mischievous grin appeared on his face.
“Ref, ref! Extra straw in play! Call a foul!”
Ema finally failed to hold back the laughter, then quietly whistled.
“Red card, you’re off the pitch!”
“Red? No! Noooooooooooo—” Athena quietly screamed towards heaven with fists clenched and raised in despair. Apollo chuckled, gently pushed them down and gave her a quick peck on the cheek as consolation.
With that little mishap out of the way and the tabletop cleaned, Trucy turned to Apollo with curiosity shining in her eye.
“So, Polly, it’s your time to share! Where, or rather, when would you wanna travel to?”
“Nowhere.” The answer was instant and snappy.
It raised more than a single eyebrow at the table.
“Really?” Ema inquired. “You’re not a little bit curious to see, for example, how the new Justice Law Offices will look a few years from now? Or to meet some of your other inspirations for becoming a lawyer — Mia Fey and Ryunosuke Naruhodo, was it? — in person? Or maybe even meet your dad one last time?”
Apollo’s face held absolutely no traces of levity.
“No. You’re right, Ema — time paradoxes are nothing to mess around with. The risks do not outweigh the gain. You already mentioned paradoxes when visiting the past, but even travelling to the future is dangerous. What if I don’t like the future I see and change its course in the present? I would’ve changed events based on a timeline that doesn’t exist anymore. What prompted me to alter the present then?”
“I think you’d create an alternate timeline,” Ema added, deep in thought and tapping her chin with her index finger.
“Or I might poof out of existence. I’d rather not risk it.” Apollo remained resolute.
He drank the very last drops of milkshake still remaining in the glass after Athena’s accident before continuing. “Besides, why would I want to live in a different time? I’m living the best days of my life right now.”
This statement raised all the eyebrows at the table.
“I finally reconnected with Dhurke and made peace with him. I made the country where I grew up fairer and better. I made sure Clay rests peacefully and accepted his passing. I work in my dream job where I’ve helped countless people. I found my family. And finally, I’m in the company of wonderful people who I’m glad to call my dear friends. I wouldn’t change that for anything else in the world.”
The unexpected burst of sincerity from the usually reserved Apollo caught everyone off-guard. Trucy’s grin was once again wide and dazzling, Ema made a noise suspiciously similar to a “d’awwww” while clasping her hands together and even Simon spared him from a cutting remark as his smile seemed softer than usual.
However, Apollo could tell by their stares that they had noticed a glaring omission. And as if to confirm his suspicion, as soon as he turned to his side to fix it, he was met with a bright yellow light from a recently reattached Widget, tightly knit lips and sapphire eyes staring at him in confusion. He gently took her palm again.
“And most importantly, I have my lovely Athena at my side. What more could I ask for? This really is the best time of my life. I love you so, so much,” he finished with a soft whisper.
The overwhelming mix of happiness, passion and hope sparked in Athena’s core, quickly setting it ablaze and spreading with ease throughout her whole being — from the rapid beat of her heart, to Widget turning vibrant and green, to her smile finally blooming forth, to her eyes filling with tears of joy.
“Aw, cielo! I… I love you too!” Even if the tremble in her voice muddled her pronunciation, the way she lunged at Apollo and embraced him in a tight hug and a passionate kiss showed how much she returned the sentiment.
Before Apollo could even register Athena’s actions and return the genuine love being poured onto him, the loving moment was interrupted by Ema’s shout.
“Athena, careful, the chai—”
But it was too late, as inertia carried them forth, letting gravity take over and drop the duo harshly to the floor. Everyone else at the table jerked in an empathetic reflex. Their fall instantly attracted the attention of other attendees of the café, drawing worried gazes, shouts and the pointing of children.
Thankfully, no harm had come to them and even the chair remained intact. The same couldn’t be said about their dignities.
After they sheepishly got up, dusted themselves off, reassured the other patrons that they were fine and picked up their seating, Blackquill let out an exasperated sigh.
“You know, I’ve changed my mind. Right now, I wish to be a soldier in 1915, participating in the battle of Gallipoli. I get mercilessly mowed down by a trooper of the Ottoman Empire during a massive, pointless infantry charge and slowly die in the mud, but I’m glad, for I’m blissfully unaware of the shame brought onto me by two reckless lovebirds in front of me.”
And thus, that day the terrace of “Jours passes ” was graced by the presence of two red-faced warblers. How could you tell? Well, what other lovebirds possessed such spectacularly crimson features on their faces?