Work Text:
December 24, 2026
Phoenix Wright sat contentedly in the front passenger seat, a warm bucket of fried chicken in his lap and the car radio blissfully silent. Though it was hardly the first evening he had spent accompanying his partner Miles Edgeworth on a simple errand, it was the first Christmas since they had mutually decided there was nothing more to gain by hiding their relationship from the public, and if Phoenix was being fully honest, the double life they had been leading had gotten old fast. Finally, he could put to rest the charade of piling reused boxes under Charley while the real celebration happened at home. He could celebrate as openly as he liked with his nearest and dearest, as simply or as extravagantly as they pleased.
This year, they were going simple. Fried chicken and a movie of Trucy’s choice. Pearl and Jinxie were coming for a sleepover, so while Phoenix and Miles were out picking up the chicken, Trucy was at home getting ready to host her friends for the night. Simple plans in theory, but Phoenix knew his daughter and her friends, and they had a way of making even the simplest plans into noisy chaos, so as much as he enjoyed seeing the girls have fun together, he wanted to savor the quiet of being in the car with only Miles as much as possible.
Said blissful quiet was interrupted all too soon by the sound of police sirens. Just a block ahead of them was a row of parked police cars with lights blaring as uniformed officers put up yellow tape around a building’s entrance.
“I wonder what happened here,” Phoenix muttered. He hoped it wasn’t a murder. The last thing they needed was another murder on Christmas.
Miles was already pulling over. “Let’s have a look,” he said.
“Do we have to?” He knew his partner’s work was important to him, but the couch… the pajamas… the fried chicken on his lap….
“We are in the Mazda,” Miles reminded him. “It wouldn’t do to have the Chief Prosecutor-elect drive past a crime scene without at least being informed of what was happening.”
While they had been keeping the relationship a secret, Miles had gotten a more discreet and slightly bigger car to ferry him and Trucy around without being recognized. That car now spent most of its time sitting in the garage unless they needed it for a bigger group outing as Miles preferred to use the same flashy red Mazda that he used for work. Of course, with how famous Miles was, this made the Mazda very recognizable, and with how invested he got in both his work and the politics around it, he might as well be on call whenever he was out in public. This had only amplified during his campaign for Chief Prosecutor, even after the election results had been announced.
Phoenix did frequently tell Miles that he struggled with work-life balance, but he chose to keep quiet about that for now. As he got out of the car, one arm around the chicken bucket, he noticed a familiar detective in a white lab coat quickly approaching.
“Mr. Edgeworth! I’m so glad you’re here,” said Ema, grinning with relief and unbridled admiration. “I hope this isn’t intruding on any plans…?” Her eyes darted over to Phoenix and the bucket in his hands. “Hi, Mr. Wright.”
Phoenix grinned awkwardly. “Hi, Ema.”
“It’s no trouble at all, Detective Skye,” Miles lied through his teeth. “Perhaps you could give us a quick summary and we’ll decide how to proceed from there.”
Ema looked thoughtful. “I’m not sure how much of a summary I can give, but okay.” She opened something on her phone. “We got the call not too long ago. Apparently, someone was found dead in one of the karaoke rooms upstairs. I haven’t gotten a chance to look around yet, but right now we’re trying to secure a perimeter and not let anyone leave. Cases tend to go cold around the holidays and we’re hoping to solve this one while the trail is hot.”
Miles nodded in approval. “Excellent work,” he said, lighting up a familiar gleam in Ema’s eyes. “It seems my help may be needed after all. We’ll be back shortly.” Grabbing Phoenix by the arm, he led him back to the car, gently shoving him into the passenger seat before sitting down behind the wheel.
Stabilizing the bucket between his knees, Phoenix buckled his seatbelt. “Where are we going?” he asked.
“Home, at least for a moment.” Miles turned his key in the ignition. “We can’t leave Trucy and the others waiting for their food. Then I will come back here to investigate. You are free to join me if you’d like.”
“Daddy’s back!” Trucy called as Phoenix opened the front door. At the familiar sound of the door opening, their dog Pess leapt to her feet, bounding up to Phoenix and eagerly sniffing the bucket in his hands.
Phoenix smiled at the dog’s predictable antics. “It’s not for you,” he said firmly, holding the bucket out of reach as he kicked off his shoes and nudged the door shut behind him.
“Let me help you, Mr. Nick,” came another familiar voice, and Phoenix felt the burden in his arms lighten as Pearl effortlessly lifted the bucket from below and carried it to the living room where Jinxie sat shyly on the couch. She set it down on the coffee table in front of three large bowls with unopened packets of instant ramen. A baby gate separated the living room from the entry hall, and although Phoenix was sure that Pess could jump over it if she really wanted to, Miles had trained her well to respect the gate.
Trucy glanced around behind Phoenix at the front door. “Where’s Papa?”
Miles came in a moment later. “I’m terribly sorry,” he said. “I can’t be around for too long. There has been an incident in a karaoke venue and I already promised Detective Skye that I would help with the investigation.”
“Oh.” Trucy hung her head for a moment before brightening up again. “But at least you can get some practice in, right, Daddy? For your big comeback?”
Jinxie fiddled with the remote control. Behind the menu options for subtitle settings, Phoenix noticed Trucy’s choice of movie: KPop Demon Hunters, the singalong version. Despite the movie having released a year and a half ago, there was still a surprising amount of hype for it among enduring fans of all ages. Still, it wasn’t as easy to find live singalong events as it had been a year ago. Phoenix still couldn’t forget how excited Trucy had been to watch the singalong movie in theaters and how dashed that excitement had been when the woman in the seat beside them had complained that their singing was “distracting” for her children. No doubt she was still trying to heal the wound through private watch parties.
“I don’t know about any ‘big comeback,’” Phoenix answered, scratching the spot on his head that always itched under the beanie. “I was kind of hoping to become one with the couch.”
“Maybe this time, couch can wait,” Trucy insisted. “It’s not going anywhere, and neither are we, at least until Jinxie’s daddy comes to pick her up tomorrow.”
Pearl bit her thumb thoughtfully. “Mr. Edgeworth is your special someone, isn’t he?” Still not fully used to the idea, she studied his reaction. “This is an evening for special someones. You should do something together!”
Phoenix laughed awkwardly. He supposed this was what he got for telling Pearl the truth, though at least it beat her constantly nudging him to be more “special someone-like” with Maya. “Even if that something is investigating a murder?”
“Anything can be romantic with the right person,” Pearl said, clapping her hands over her cheeks the way she always used to do over her “special someone” fantasies. “Mystic Maya always said you and Mr. Edgeworth could get lost in each other’s eyes even standing over a bloody corpse. Maybe she was right all along!”
“Okay, okay,” Phoenix conceded. “Save some chicken for us, won’t you?”
As all the girls eagerly promised not to devour the entire bucket before Phoenix and Miles came back, Pearl stepped through the baby gate and gently shoved Phoenix toward the door, barely leaving him any time to put his shoes back on. “Have fun, you two!” she called as she closed and locked the door behind them.
Phoenix was loath to admit it in front of anyone other than Miles, but he had started to miss the mental exercise of investigation.
He hadn’t been completely idle for the last seven years, of course. He had spent a lot of time and mental energy investigating the forgery he had been framed for while playing mind games with his prime suspect. There had been the occasional trip to Europe with Miles, and those had provided a much needed break, but now that they were back home and the threat was gone, Phoenix was slowly getting used to the idea that poking around crime scenes could be his daily reality again.
But even more than he missed investigating without the threat looming over his head, he missed seeing Miles in his element, piecing together information and grilling witnesses for answers.
They had only been at the crime scene for about half an hour, but they had figured out a lot: the victim was a regular at this karaoke venue, one of the few who had come here alone on Christmas Eve, though the venue owner had gotten rather uncomfortable at the mention of the victim coming alone. From this and a few other specific clues, Miles had pieced together that the victim had been in a secret relationship with the owner much like he and Phoenix had been. All the other guests had come with partners or family members, including a woman who the owner had struggled to stay professional with due to past negative interactions. Her companion was a very tall man in a trenchcoat who had remained silent.
The witness who had reported the crime mentioned seeing a man in a trenchcoat fleeing the room, though with how quickly the police perimeter had been set up, it didn’t seem likely that the man had escaped. According to the witness, he had an awkward gait and had been walking slowly even while fleeing a crime scene. “And he was really tall, at least seven feet,” the witness emphasized. “You couldn’t possibly miss him. Unless he was moving slowly to psych everyone out or something, I don’t see him getting far.”
“Perhaps he was hindered by the coat,” Miles speculated. “If he escaped before the police arrived, he might have taken his coat off and stashed it somewhere. Detective Skye?”
“On it!” Ema gave a cheerful salute before disappearing with a group of officers.
Phoenix couldn’t help but wonder if that explanation was too simple. “Maybe he didn’t escape,” he suggested. “We’ve talked to just about everyone who was still here, but has anyone checked the bathrooms?”
Miles repeated his question to a pair of officers, and they confirmed that while the women’s bathroom was empty, there was one stall occupied in the men’s, with what looked like two children inside based on the feet visible under the door. “I’ll have to confirm with the owner just to be sure,” Miles said, “but I thought I saw a sign earlier about age restrictions past a certain hour. This is getting interesting.”
Could it be…? It was admittedly a little out there, but there was a possibility that Phoenix couldn’t discount. “Well? What are we waiting for?”
As strange as Phoenix’s ideas often sounded, Miles had to admit that the strange ideas he came up with did have a way of coming true.
Like many of the officers, Miles had been quick to dismiss the children in the bathroom as irrelevant to the case, but Phoenix was the sort of person to not let any possibility slip, no matter how ridiculous it seemed at first glance. That was what Miles liked about bringing his partner on investigations, he offered a fresh perspective. Not to mention that he was much better with kids than Miles ever claimed to be.
“It’s okay, you’re not in trouble,” Phoenix assured the closed stall door. “You said you came here with your mom, right?”
“Yeah,” said what Miles imagined was the older of the two boys. “She said she was getting us water, but she never came back. We couldn’t find her either.”
“Maybe she went to the bathroom,” the younger boy said in a quieter voice.
All of the adult patrons they’d seen earlier had been with partners or family members. Unless there was another family member the boys hadn’t mentioned, their mother was not someone they’d crossed paths with.
“Was it just your mom with you?” Phoenix asked, as if reading Miles’ thoughts.
“Yeah, it was just her,” said the older boy. “We have Christmas with Mom but we’re going to Dad’s place for New Year’s.”
So they definitely hadn’t seen the boys’ mother earlier. The police had been looking for a tall man in a trenchcoat per the witness’s description, but if Miles knew what Phoenix was thinking, that had been a deliberate diversion. Those poor boys were trapped in a bathroom stall, afraid that they would be in trouble and waiting for a parent who likely had no plans to return. A feeling that Miles was all too familiar with…
Phoenix hesitated for a moment. “We’re looking for your mom right now,” he eventually said. “Why don’t you two come with us until we find her?”
Some hesitation. “We’re not in trouble, are we?” asked the younger boy.
“No, you’re not,” Phoenix reassured them. “We just need to make sure you have a grown-up with you when you go home.”
Moments later, the stall door opened, a gray trenchcoat hanging from a hook on the door.
“That’s the coat,” Miles said.
The younger boy stared at the floor, half-hiding behind his older brother as they shuffled out of the stall. “Mom said we had to wear it if we came here after 10 PM.”
Miles had to marvel once again at his partner’s uncanny ability to sniff out unusual methods of carrying out a crime. When they had confirmed the age restriction with the owner, Phoenix had wondered if the “man in a trenchcoat” the police had been told to look for was actually two children, and it did seem to be true. Between the unusual absence of the boys’ mother, the negative interactions between her and the owner, and the fact that the trenchcoat was her idea, Miles wondered if the disguise had served a dual purpose: not only did it disguise the boys’ age to get around the restriction, it created a red herring suspect who could be observed at the crime scene while the real culprit got away.
Soon enough, they had gotten the boys to a more comfortable room and heard their side of the story. It had been almost 10 PM when their mother had finally agreed to take them to karaoke, and in between songs, they had caught bits of what was playing in the booth next door and had gotten curious about it, sometimes copying their neighbor’s song choices. Their mother had left to get water but hadn’t returned, and eventually the neighboring booth had gotten quiet. They had put the trenchcoat back on and gone to investigate, and upon opening the door, they had seen the sole occupant lying on the floor, clearly dead, and had rushed off (to the best of their ability while stacked under the coat) to try and find their mother. They couldn’t find her, and when they heard screaming from down the hall, they’d gotten scared and hidden in the bathroom.
“Mr. Edgeworth!” Ema interrupted, carrying a stack of new evidence in baggies. “I didn’t find the coat, but I did find blood smudges with unknown partial fingerprints on the—” She stopped short, noticing the boys who were now huddled together on the couch opposite him and Phoenix. “...Sorry to interrupt. I’ll get these to the lab instead. Were you still looking for the coat?”
Despite her bitter appearance around many, Ema was still every bit the enthusiastic teenager Miles remembered. “Good work, Detective Skye. And I do believe we’ve found the coat already,” he said. “In fact, we may have found everything we need for now.”
“Except a responsible adult for them,” Phoenix said, motioning with his head to indicate the boys. “I’d hate to leave them at the station overnight, but if we have to…”
“You can call Dad,” the older boy piped up. “I memorized his number.”
Ema breathed a sigh of relief. “I can have him pick you up at the station. We’ll drive you straight there, okay?” She turned to Miles and Phoenix. “I’ve got it covered from here. Go enjoy the rest of the night, I won’t keep you two any longer.”
The drive home was unusually subdued, Phoenix staring out the window with the brim of his hat casting a shadow over his face. Miles wondered what he was thinking. Even though he was seven years out of practice in the courtroom, his investigative skills had proven to be as sharp as ever, possibly sharp enough to rival anyone else on the team. His name had been cleared two months ago, but he still hadn’t made any move to come back, avoiding the topic whenever it was brought up. Did he think he wasn’t needed?
Because it wasn’t true. Miles needed him. Miles never would have broken away from his former mentor if not for him, never would have grown beyond what he had been taught, wouldn’t have a reason to think twice about any first assumption. Miles needed Phoenix because he challenged him every day and made him think twice. In the current age, nobody seemed to think twice about anything.
Miles’ phone buzzed in his pocket as they pulled into the driveway. Once he’d parked the car, he pulled out his phone and read the incoming message.
“Ema says that the boys’ father picked up on the first ring,” he told Phoenix. “He’s on his way to the station to take them home. He said he was considering having the custody agreement revised.”
“Depending on what we find, we might end up saving him some time in court,” Phoenix remarked.
We. Did that mean he was thinking about coming back? Maybe he only said it because of how involved he had been in the investigation thus far, but Miles hoped he was thinking about coming back to the courtroom.
“I’m just glad they have someone,” Phoenix continued. “I hate to see a kid left alone because of bad decisions the adults around them made.”
Miles knew that Phoenix was talking about the cases he had handled nearly a decade ago. Some of them had ended with parents being arrested or disappearing indefinitely only to reappear seven years too late. “You did everything you could,” Miles reminded him. “You always have.”
“I know,” Phoenix said. “I just wish I could do more sometimes. Or that I did something different. Like Pearls, I should have told her the truth from the beginning, then maybe she wouldn’t have tried to ‘gravely roast’ anyone.” He laughed bitterly in a way that Miles could tell was him trying not to cry.
“We don’t always know what the best course of action is at the time we need to,” Miles told him. “What matters is that we do what we think is best and are prepared to reconsider what that is in the future. I haven’t been the best at that latter part. But you, Phoenix… you’ve always been open to reconsider, and you’ve done well to pick up the pieces. You’re the kind of person I always needed in my life.”
Phoenix turned to face him, his already soft eyes made even softer by the dim illumination of distant street lamps. “I want to kiss you so bad right now.”
Miles smirked, leaning closer. “What’s stopping you?”
Phoenix shrugged, shaking his head with a smile. He closed the gap between them. For just a moment, the world narrowed down to just the two of them, nothing beyond the confines of the car, and all of the passion that had been missing came to life in the soft press of Phoenix’s lips against his.
But as quickly as the moment came, it faded as Phoenix’s stomach rumbled and they remembered they had a movie night to attend and hopefully still some fried chicken to eat. “We should head inside,” Phoenix mumbled, unbuckling his seatbelt as he broke away.
Miles would be lying if he said he wasn’t somewhat disappointed to hear the TWICE cover of Takedown playing as soon as they came home. Even if he had to miss most of the movie, he would have liked to join in on at least one song toward the end. At least the girls enjoyed it, he reminded himself as he put away his coat and shoes. That was what mattered most.
Phoenix, having simply kicked off his shoes, was the first to reach the living room. “We’re back,” he announced. “Did you have fun?”
“Mm-hm,” the girls chorused, half distracted. Approaching the living room now, Miles could see why— they had done their hair to match the lead characters with varying degrees of success, and Jinxie was now sitting in the middle of the group as Pearl and Trucy each tried tightening one of the twin buns they had done on her. Pearl was hard to recognize without her usual pretzel hairstyle and her hair was longer than Miles had first thought, almost reaching her waist in a single braid. Trucy’s hair was half up in pigtails, which he knew was meant to evoke the “problem child,” but on Trucy, it was too cute to have that effect.
The bucket of chicken was still on the coffee table beside three bowls with only trace amounts of ramen broth. “Is there any chicken left for us?” Miles asked as he and Phoenix bent to clear away the bowls.
“We saved half the bucket for you,” said Pearl, giving up on Jinxie’s hair as she joined him and Phoenix on their way to the kitchen carrying the bucket. Out the corner of his eye, Miles watched Trucy take over for her. “You might have to reheat it, but there should be plenty for you and Mr. Nick to share.”
“Thanks, Pearls,” Phoenix said as he deposited the bowls in the sink, gratefully laying out the remaining chicken in the air fryer. “Now that you finished the movie, what’s the plan for the rest of the night?” Miles couldn’t tell if he was projecting or not, but he swore he heard a note of disappointment in Phoenix’s voice when he mentioned finishing the movie.
Pearl giggled. “You’ll see.” She opened the fridge and took out the water pitcher. “Mr. Edgeworth, could you get out some glasses for us?”
Miles took five glasses out of the cabinet and filled them with water, then helped Pearl carry four of them to the living room.
“Ta-da!” Trucy had just finished with Jinxie’s hair and sat back to show Miles. “What do you think, Papa?”
The twin buns were much tighter against the back of Jinxie’s head, the shy girl managing a smile as she tested the weight. “It looks very good,” Miles said, nodding in approval.
Just then, a widely grinning Pearl emerged from behind the couch, having snuck behind while the others were distracted. “Hey, have a good break?” She held out two glasses of water which the other two gladly accepted, eagerly gulping it down to refresh themselves from all the singing they had done before.
“What do you mean?” Trucy asked with an equally wide grin once she’d finished her water. “We literally just sat down…”
“...Why are you holding the remote control?” Jinxie said quietly, looking at the remote control that, indeed, was in Pearl’s hands.
Pearl broke character. “Since Mr. Nick and Mr. Edgeworth missed it the first time, we’re going to do a rewatch.”
Soon enough, Phoenix was back in the living room with two generous plates of reheated chicken and they all found seats on or around the couch, ready to sing their hearts out, as Pearl pressed the button to replay the movie from the beginning.