#Klavier crying to apollo and trucy: HES GOING TO KILL ME

[abluescarfonwaston]

Hope you don’t mind me asking, but how would the other prosecutors react to fruitbat Miles? Would Godot start calling him pup (as a replacement for kitten)? Would Klavier be mindful of how loud he plays his music? Simon being sorta the animal guy, would he be curious? Sorry for asking so much. I love your take on the AU and am always excited to hear more!

I never mind people engaging with stuff!!! I think Miles is fairly private about his nature for the most part. The other prosecutors are Very aware of the fact him and the Von Karma's are vampires but Von Karma was Very insistent that Miles never eat in public so the 'fruit bat' distinction is something very few of them are aware of. HR warns new hires that if they Do take the stairs despite it being 12+ floors that they should be aware that they May see a large bat flying up or down the stairs. That's the Chief Prosecutor. Beware what you say where he can hear.

I think Diego jumping through the eight mental hoops to go -vampire- bat- baby bats are pups- Alright Puppies lets go and just changing his entire metaphor to suit the prosecutor better is Very funny. One of the few days Godot and Miles are both in the office Godot finds Miles (not) sleeping above the coffee maker while it brews a new pot. Godot just stares at the bat sleeping in the steam of the coffee Machine until its done. Miles opens his eyes and PANIC. He panic flys out of the room and hides in his office clutching his chest for 20 minutes. Godot just pours himself a cup and stifles a smile.

Klavier is completely unaware of any issues until the Chief stomps into his office and unplugs his equipment. Gets a Furious long winded lecture about letting his equipment scream at all hours of the night and day. Apollo and Trucy see him that week and he's CONVINCED Edgeworth is going to suck him dry. Trucy (knows her uncle is a fruit bat) is practicing her poker face SO Hard. He decides to get rid of the equipment and be 'professional' like Kristoph told him to be. To solve the problem. Herr Von Karma watches him tearfully take down his stuff only to collapse in relief after he unplugs one speaker. "Oh gods that awful noise stopped." Turns out one of his speakers was just Blaring a high pitched frequency constantly and after he fixed it they had no issues. Those rooms are VERY well sound proofed.

Simon - goth to his core had a vampire contact him about a work arrangement while in prison. He doesn't Really want to be a vampire or anything but he's SO ready to play up the thralled minion at any opportunity. He Does kinda owe him a life debt after all. Edgeworth does Not enjoy. Franziska adores it. He's probably the only one who has Seen Edgeworth's bat form and realized he's not a vampire bat. He's a fruit bat. He brings pineapple to his yearly reviews and enjoys watching Edgeworth try Not to drool or ask for some. For the sake of his image.

[4ragon]

So I just reblogged another aa fanfic masterlist, and that seemed like a cool idea. SO, since so many people are migrating to here from Twitter (and especially since this is the only place where my name doesn't match my AO3 account) I thought should put a list of my AA fics together! (I'd do the other fandoms but I don't think I'd have a substantial enough list)

So here's the JJ Ace Attorney fanfic masterlist:

Long Fics -

The Miraculous Disappearance Of Phoenix Wright (107,213 words)

Phoenix Wright wakes up in a world where he never existed. What will he do when he's trapped in a world where everything he's ever loved is gone? Minor narumitsu. My first AA fic, and the fic that got me back into writing for the first time since I was a shitty teenager.

(Also please read the tags, this one has some heavy subject matter and a LOT of spoilers)

Singderella (28,103 words)

Apollo decides to try his hand at a singing contest, held by a certain ex-rockstar, for a chance to win some runner-up money. He didn't want to win the dang contest. And he sure as hell didn't want to become Klavier Gavin's mysterious disappearing muse. This one is Klapollo and this one's Silly As Hell.

Vacation All I Ever Wanted (111,197 words)

Six lawyers and a magician spend a week at the beach. One condo. Six lawyers. Seven secret plans. What could possibly go wrong? Established narumitsu, getting-together klapollo, platonic Athena and Simon, and Trucy Wright in all her glory. (Also has some AA4 and 5 spoilers)

also @/ministarfruit drew me fanart and it made me cry

Shorter Klapollo fics -

Google Search: how to turn off a gaviners alarm clock

Google Search: off button on gaviners alarm clock Google Search: how to end my suffering Google Search: please god i just wanted to sleep in

No I did not write this as a thinly veiled excuse to complain about my roommate's alarm clock what are you talking about

Also fanart from @/lycheestew

Don't Get Too Comfortable

Apollo gets caught in a rainstorm, so Klavier invites him to wait it out at his condo. Written for the Klapollo Unfolding Melody zine. I'm really proud of this one!

Either Way

It's Klavier's first week back since the Misham Trial, and Klavier had yet to gather the courage to see Apollo Justice. At least, until Apollo Justice grabs him in a panic and shoves the two of them into a broom closet.

(Klapollo Week 2021 - Protection)

Atroquinine My Love (Accoustic)

When Apollo asks Klavier for guitar lessons, Klavier is more than happy to oblige. Written for the 2021 Klapollo minibang, featuring lovely art from the wonderful @/nhuquyen

Half-and-Half

Klavier and Apollo go on their first date. That's it. That's the fic.

(Klapollo Week 2021 - Firsts)

Of Petals and Punctuality

Klavier forgets about their anniversary. That's also it. (Everyone also says this fic makes them sad but I thought it was fucking funny when I wrote it)

(Klapollo Week 2021 - Flowers)

Just A Quiet Morning

Apollo Justice wakes up to make breakfast on his wedding anniversary.

(Klapollo Week 2023 - Domesticity)

Schatz

“Hey, Athena, what does ‘shots’ mean?” Pre-dating, Athena and Phoenix mess with Apollo.

(Klapollo Week 2023 - Nicknames)

Narumitsu fics -

Procrastination

Prompt: Pre-dating narumitsu pinning and yearning for each other and all their friends and family trying to find a way for them to be finally be together

This was for a secret santa.

The Gentleman Always Gets the Girl

Sorry, Mr. Edgeworth, but the gentleman always gets the girl.

(Narumitsu Week 2023 - Foreign)

But I Thought You Hated The Mall

Miles takes Trucy to the mall. This does not go as planned.

(Narumitsu Week 2023 - Family)

Gen Fics -

A Different Kind of Lullaby (Warning, major AAI2 Spoilers)

“Hi Mr. Edgeworth, do you think Pops killed my mom?”

@/ehlihr drew the coolest fucking comic btw holy shit

Baking and Entering

Kay and Sebastian break into Edgeworth's house to bake a cake. This one was for the Dadworth Lion Lillies zine and I'm also super proud of it.

Juniper Dumped Me

Wait, wait when were Juniper and I dating?!

In which Juniper dumps Apollo, who absolutely knows what's happening, don't worry about it. Minor Junithena, literally the stupidest thing I've ever written. Dedicated to my discord friends who helped me come up with the idea.

Home Is Where The Heart Is

Kay Faraday has a secret and Miles has to get to the bottom of it. Also has some AAI2 spoilers.

Another Trip Around The Sun

Apollo Justice's first birthday without Clay Terran. Minor klapollo. It's a story about grief and I did cry while writing it.

Just a Roll of Stamps

It's been a year since Phoenix officially adopted Trucy, and Phoenix is starting to worry that she hasn't made any friends.

(Wright Family Week 2021 - Friends)

Bet On It

Apollo and Athena vs. Trucy and Phoenix. Whoever beats the escape room first wins. Whoever loses buys noodles for a year. But…it can't be that simple, right?

(Wright Family Week 2021 - Scheming and Hijinks)

Dear Runo

Phoenix and Trucy decide to clean out their spare room, and discover an old cardboard box labeled Grandpa Ryuu. Inside, they discover some old books, some letters, and possibly an old secret?! (Or maybe not). This one was for another secret santa exchange.

First Class Accomodations

After the events of Investigations 2, Sebastian Debeste is invited to spend a few nights at the Courtney residence while he figures out what to do next.

This was written for the AA Writer Zine and I am very proud of it.

Tumblr Original Ficlets

Ficlets include narumitsu, klapollo, and a few junithena, and one (1) blackmadhi.

Anyway, I think that's everything. Y'all super don't have to read these, I just wanted all of them in one place. If you do read them, though, feel free to let me know if you liked them! Comments and stuff make my day.

[griponthenews]

based on this post

Thank you @viophire for the VD!

[VD: an objection.lol video using clean ace attorney character sprites. the sprite actions are marked in [brackets.]

klavier gavin presents a gif of a pineapple being squeezed bt a hydraulic press until the juice sprays out the bottom.

klavier: after my werewolf boyfriend pulls out

apollo justice: [shocked] your WHAT

klavier: [pointing] my werewolf boyfriend

judge: I'm sorry, am I reading that right??

klavier: [sweating] MY [a cropped image of a werewolf leaning over]

trucy wright, as co-counsel: So we're just gonna ignore the watermelon getting crushed?

klavier: [in green and red text] Watermelon

judge: ... [shakes head]

kristoph gavin, on the witness stand: Hey so does anyone have the nsfw version for that werewolf pic just asking

apollo: [disheartened] (I don't feel safe)

miles edgeworth, on the witness stand: (read as tumblr tags) #Also I dated a dude who thought he was a werewolf, #that was interesting, #Not as interesting as him calling his friend mom and supporting her when she kidnapped her siblings, #but like the attempt at trying to get me to roleplay some godawful shit was up there

apollo: [shocked] I'm sorry what

[the "Hold it!" bubble appears on screen.]

klavier: [sweating] i know im op this thread has absolutely gotten out of control

kristoph: hold on op aren't you the person who had an iq of 4?

[a gallery shot of the jury muttering.]

gallery: ...

[the judge bangs his gavel.]

judge: [shocked] I'm crying. Nobody's clearing anything up, they just deflect onto the next plot twist

disbarred phoenix wright, on the witness stand, all caps: WHAT IS HAPPENING?

trucy, side-on in all caps: OP'S THE GUY FROM THE HORNY IHOP WAITER POST

phoenix, all caps: THE HORNY WHAT?

klavier: [shocked, sweating] ...

wocky kitaki, on the witness stand: [twirling hair] Since we're just listing them off my favorite Wereralph post is the poptart pussy one

[the "Hold it!" bubble appears again.]

apollo, in caps: [shocked] THE WHAT?!

[the screen fades to black before showing a younger klavier.]

younger klavier: Oh, My Pussy? It like a toaster go like [snaps] *Ding* poptarts roasted and ready

apollo: [thinking] I am so fucking concerned for the mental health of 95% of the people on this hellsite

trucy: personally i'm at 96%

[the judge bangs his gavel.]

judge: [shakes head] This post keeps getting worse

kristoph: [angry] I often find myself wondering how this website is so utterly incapable of making money, and then I see posts like this and I am violently given my answer.

apollo: [slams desk] For the love of god, stop asking "the what?" that's how this continues!

wocky: But what about the thirty for Minotaur?

apollo: [embarrased] Ahem. The what?

judge: [shakes head] No. Cancelled.

[the screen flashes white and shakes]

klavier: [looking up] But why?

apollo: [thinking] I. Just. (What the fuck do I do with this information now)

ema skye, on the witness stand: [shocked] GUYS stop reblogging this. [presents an image of adam driver dressed in military clothes.] OP was in the Marine Core and is technically a war criminal.

[the image is zoomed in to full-screen as ema talks over it.]

ema: He turned a blind eye when his comrades killed innocent civilians in Baghdad. He refused [sic] testify against soldiers who committed atrocities towards civilians.

[screen fades back to the courtroom.]

ema: Stop reblogging OPs posts because that takes attention away from what OP is trying to hide.

klavier: [snaps] You sure that's me?

[klavier plays air guitar before banging the wall next to him.]

klavier: Like are you sure that's me?

["Objection!" appears on screen.]

apollo, in caps: [shocked] I'M- THAT'S ADAM DRIVER

phoenix: ...this has been a wild ride

trucy: I-

dick gumshoe, on the witness stand: It was a pineapple, not a watermelon.

phoenix: [mysterious] $29.99

/end VD.]

[blackopals-world]

Klapollo Case Fic Idea

This idea had been bouncing around my head and it needs to be free.

A famous singer's manager comes to the agency. The singer's name is name is Alto Idels. He wants Apollo's help getting Alto off the hook for a murder he didn't do.

Apollo immediately refuses. He tried to push the guy out when Athena and Trucy stop him. Apollo responds with "Then you defend him" before storming out.

In containment Klavier arrives to get a testimony from Alto.

Alto immediately thought Apollo was coming but was disappointed. Klav asked him if he knew the attorney only to get silence.

Klavier is familiar with Alto's music which was just okay by his standards. It always sounded off to him.

Alto goes to court on accusation of murdering his girlfriend. One of the roadies claimed to have seen him do it.

Apollo comes to court as Athena's co-counsel and refuses to look at Alto as it becomes glaringly obvious they know one another.

Athena had gone to meet Alto by herself earlier that day as Trucy calmed Apollo down. Alto practically begged her to let him see Apollo and her mood matrix flashed blue and pink. Sadness and love? There was a story there.

Apollo's mood on the other hand was red as can be.

"Hey AJ, it's been a while. Ive missed you. Did you get my texts?" Alto tried to awkwardly initiate conversation.

"Not the time or the place. And I deleted them." Apollo said gruffly.

Klavier felt a bit out of the loop but he didn't like the way he addressed Apollo so casually.

"Defendant, if you please. Focus on the trial at hand and not finding another victim." Klavier smiled but it wasn't warm or friendly in the slightest.

The trial goes on that day as the roadie who saw the crime had not seen the crime but heard it. She thought it was Alto because the couple were arguing earlier that day.

After the murder Ema had found a burnt notebook on that floor of the crimescene. It contained scraps of music lyrics and sheet music and it was guessed that the girlfriend destroyed his work and he killed her in anger. It being noted that the singer was going through a dry spell and had difficulty making new music.

Alto refused to disclose the nature of the argument regardless.

The case had to go on the next day with their witness knowing nothing in the end.

Athena pulled Apollo aside and asked what was going on and he wouldn't engage in anything she asked. It was clearly causing pain to defend someone he didn't like.

Klavier over heard them and asked Apollo to not work on defense but instead help out Ema and him on the investigation instead. He could still help Athena but also not interact with Alto.

Apollo reluctantly agreed since Mr.Wright already assigned him to help but didn't mention how he had to.

Klavier offered Apollo his support through the case as it was discovered that Alto's girlfriend had many issues with their arrangement especially since Alto was gay. Apollo support that line thought saying he was definitely not straight. When Klavier pressed for more information Apollo revealed that they knew each other in high school.

Klavier by this point realized that they definitely more than knew each other from what they both said and how familiar they were. Something he was certainly jealous of, wondering what gave this guy the nerve to continue pestering Apollo after whatever happened between them.

He also wondered if Apollo might take him back if he was innocent. He kind of hoped he wasn't, I'd be easier to hate him.

The came comes to ahead when putting the notebook back together song lyrics mentioned a green-eyed lover when the girlfriend had brown eyes. It was also revealed that Alto was cheating on her and evidence pointed to killing her to keep her silent.

Alto stated that the lyrics are just words and didn't mean anything.

But then an explosive shout rang from the gallery.

"You bastard! How dare you say that! Just words?! Did I mean nothing to you?!" It was none other than Apollo throwing everyone for a loop.

It was decently hysteria in the crowd as Apollo was asked to the stand to testify what that meant. Apollo denied and told them that Alto can speak for the both of them.

"Aj, I know you still mad at me but don't do this. My career-"

"Is a fucking sham! I don't want to cover for you. You decided a long time ago what was more important to you, now suffer for it."

"You can't just forgive me?"

"No...I can't"

The court was told a tale of heartbreak, betrayal, and lies. One where a teenage Apollo met a wannabe singer in band class and shared a small musical hobby. Apollo wrote music to deal with his issues and lyrics to help him understand English better since it was still his second language but now it just felt nice to make something. He wrote songs for Alto since he was trash at it and exchange Alto showered him with affection. They were a cute couple for a while until Alto sold the rights to one of Apollo's songs and began gaslighting him about how this was for their future and he is finally famous and that all this work doesn't pay for itself. Apollo didn't want to be famous or anything nor make a career out of this but he loved Alto so he went with it. When Alto finally got his first big gig he gave Apollo a present. A breakup text and a stolen notebook that had all of Apollo's music in it. He told Apollo that his producers didn't want him dating a guy because it looks bad and fans would hurt him. Apollo told him to go fuck himself and he could keep plagiarizing him as long as he never came back.

By the end everyone in court was either angry or crying over the betrayal.

In fact Apollo looked over at Phoenix and Trucy in the stands and if looks could kill. Athena was crying enraged tears as she tried to jump over the sand and give that guy a piece of her mind before a bailiff stopped her.

Klavier kept his opinion to himself but didn't pass up an opportunity to degrad the man every chance he got for the record the trial. I mean he had Apollo's devotion and love but decided to give that up for a lifeless music career. If he had the choice of Apollo or music he'd give you music everytime. Though he knew Apollo would never ask him to do that. I mean but really Apollo is just- I mean look at him! He's perfect!

Athena was caught off guard with the flurry of emotions coming from Klavier as every color flashed on her mood matrix.

The case end with a "not guilty" as it was discovered that it was the manager who killed by the girlfriend because Alto was sleeping with him and the girlfriend being just another songwriter used to cover up his lack of talent was going to become another Apollo situation where Alto never really let's them go. Alto still tried to get Apollo back regardless how how long it had been and was glued to that stupid notebook. The manager was helplessly in love with Alto and wouldn't let anyone else have him.

Outside of court Alto tried to catch up to Apollo as he left with his co-workers (family) only for Klavier to cut in front

"Herr forehead, I hope you haven't forgotten about tonight." Klavier smiled broadly was Alto chocked on his words.

"Tonight?" Apollo asked puzzled

"Yes, remember?" Klavier winked and pointed to Alto. "We have reservations."

Apollo's face lit up with recognition as he nodded "oh, right tonight. We should get going now. Or...we'll be late." Apollo practicly dragged Klavier off by the arm as he felt the glares of his friends prick his skin as they were aimed at Alto.

They needed to move fast but Alto better be faster.

[turnaboutnerd]

None of the songs Klavier wrote for Gavinners were ever about anyone. He wrote by feeling, rather than by experience.

That changes after the Gavinners breaks up—after Daryan is arrested, after Kristoph is sentenced to death, after he learns he was responsible for the false disbarment of Phoenix Wright. After he falls in love with Apollo Justice.

He writes several albums’ worth of music all based on those experiences, as a way of processing what happened, as an outlet for all the sudden and complicated emotions he doesn’t know how to handle.

He writes songs about his feelings of betrayal regarding Kristoph (and Daryan). Some of them are angry. Some of them are sad. Some of them are longing — for the brother he wished Kristoph was, for the best friend he wished never changed. He writes about his guilt over Phoenix being disbarred. He writes about his perspective as a haughty teenager thinking he did the legal world a service catching a forger — and how he realized as an adult he had initiated a brutal witch-hunt and ignited the Dark Age of Law.

He writes about falling in love with Apollo, about how he wanted to hate him, about how he couldn’t. He writes about his complicated feelings “trading” his relationship with Daryan for Apollo. Did he betray his best friend for a crush? Did loving Apollo cause him to lose his mind and turn on family?

Later, he writes about the loss of Constance Courte. He writes about wishing how he could’ve been there for Apollo after the courthouse bombing, after he lost Clay.

He keeps these songs close to him, never shares them with a soul. They’re too personal—he could never release them. Besides, he’s done with the music business, ja?

But as time continues to pass, it’s suddenly no longer enough. He’s been venting in private lyrics for a couple years, but he needs others to hear what he’s been feeling—to validate what he’s been feeling. He misses trusting others. He misses performing.

So he pulls some of his best—which also happen to be his most personal—and records them in his home studio, compresses them into mp3 files, and loads them onto an old iPod. Klavier Gavin may be ready to step into the spotlight again, to share himself with the world again—but he at least wants to give the people he’s writing about fair warning.

Kristoph refuses to see him, as usual, no matter how much Klavier pleads. Klavier does not know why he continues to try (of course he knows, it’s because Kris is his bruder), but he supposes it’s good he at least tried at all.

Daryan sees him but is furious when Klavier tells him he wants to release a solo album (Daryan has no comment on some of the songs being about him). Klavier doesn’t understand. Daryan was furious when Klavier broke up the Gavinners; now he’s furious he’s making music again. He just can’t seem to win. Daryan throws the iPod on the ground and cracks the screen, refusing to listen to it. Klavier picks it up, dusts it off, and takes it with him regardless.

Klavier actually has more anxiety facing Herr Wright than he does Kristoph and Daryan. He knew it would go poorly with them; he doesn’t know how Phoenix will react, especially since they’ve never... properly talked about everything that happened.

But Phoenix is cordial, tells him he’s glad to hear Klavier is recording again (though his wallet won’t be, he jokes, with reference to Trucy; Klavier smiles crookedly, unsure how to take the joke). Phoenix is the first to actually take the iPod and listen to the album—the whole thing, even though Klavier only intended for him to hear the songs about him.

While Phoenix sits at his desk, pensively listening to each song, Klavier sits on the office couch, fidgeting nervously, trying to use his phone as a distraction. Finally, when Phoenix finishes, he pulls out his headphones, compliments Klavier on the great work, and says he’s sure it’s going to be a big hit.

Klavier thanks him but internally, he’s just like... that’s it? That’s all he has to say?

But Phoenix, already knowing what Klavier’s actually looking for, then smiles and says, “What? Was there something else you wanted me to say? Didn’t you know I already forgave you for the whole badge thing years ago?”

Klavier can’t help it: He starts bawling on the couch of the defense attorney he mistakenly disbarred nearly a decade earlier. Phoenix is totally unphased, but the episode catches Klavier by surprise. He hadn’t realized how badly he needed to cry about this—how cathartic it feels. Phoenix brings him tissues, wraps a fatherly arm around Klavier, and continues to talk about how he doesn’t blame Klavier and he knows this all has been very difficult for him too, etc. and it actually makes Klavier cry harder until he’s shaking and Phoenix is holding him like a father would his son.

Once Klavier calms down and is feeling better, Phoenix can’t help but ask: “Are some of those songs about Apollo?” He doesn’t have to specify which ones; they both know he means the love songs. Klavier says they are. “You should share this with him too,” Phoenix finishes, giving him back the iPod.

Klavier was already planning on it, but it makes him feel more nervous than before. (Ach, the songs are obviously about Apollo, aren’t they?) The next time he catches Apollo in the courthouse, he practically shoves the iPod into his hands, tells him he wrote a new album, and that he wants Apollo to be one of the first to hear it.

Apollo, for one, is utterly baffled. “Uh... I’m happy for you, that you’re writing music again, Prosecutor Gavin, but... you know I never was a fan of the Gavinners, right?”

Klavier’s hand trembles a little as he coolly flicks some of his bangs out of his face. “Sure, but this isn’t the Gavinners, ja? It’s pure Klavier Gavin content.”

Apollo remains confused but begrudgingly agrees to listen to the album that night, “if I have the time.” Klavier is partially relieved that he won’t have to watch Apollo listen to the damn thing like he had to with Herr Wright, but it means the suspense nearly kills him.

He’s utterly unproductive for the rest of the evening and following morning, waiting anxiously for a message or call from Apollo to let him know what he thinks—

And then Apollo walks into his office, looking sheepish and shy. Klavier’s heart leaps into his throat when Apollo holds the iPod out to him.

“I listened to it,” Apollo says, unable to look Klavier in the eye. “I, uh... had no idea you felt that way about me. I kinda knew that you were having a hard time with the other stuff, but, um...”

He’s blushing a bright red, and Klavier swallows hard before hoarsely answering, “Ja.”

Apollo manages to bring his eyes to Klavier’s then. “So... when are you going to release it?”

Klavier shakes his head. “I’m not sure. Soon. But I’m not sure.”

That’s when Apollo screws up his nerve and says, “Well. Before you do, can you at least take me out on a proper date before you go announcing your feelings for me to the world?”

Klavier is more than happy to comply, and the album is later released to critical acclaim.

[wardencommanderrodimiss]

Witches, Chapter 19: yeah there’s actually still one last little bit of investigation left in this case. I’m sorry too. Now who wants backstory for side characters in a DLC case!

[Seelie of Kurain Chapter Masterlist] [ao3]

[Witches Chapter Masterlist] [ao3]

----

For all her bluff and bluster about getting back to investigating in the face of Blackquill’s disdain, Athena doesn’t seem to have a clue what they should do next. She tromps in stocking feet back into the aquarium, Phoenix and Pearl trailing behind her, and stares at a poster on the wall with life cycle facts about penguins for five minutes before she suggests that they go visit Sasha, because if Blackquill was here, then he had to be done interrogating her, right?

Pearl remains behind at the aquarium to get settled in, and Athena complains the whole drive to the detention center because Phoenix made her put her wet shoes back on instead of driving barefoot. “I’m wearing tights!” she insists. “It’s not barefoot!”

“Shoes, kiddo.”

“They’re wet! It’s gross!”

“Should’ve thought of that before you threw a bucket of water at a witch.” Or whatever he is. Fae-adjacent, the same vague broad classification to encompass Phoenix and Trucy and Klavier and Thalassa. Apollo’s not quite there yet.

“Wicked witch of the bench afraid he’d melt if it hit him, you think?” She steps out onto the parking lot asphalt and winces at the tiny rocks digging into her feet. “Okay,” she sighs. “Shoes.”

As they wait at the detention center for Sasha to be brought out, Athena turns, very seriously, to Phoenix. “Alright, Boss, we’ve gotta cheer Sasha up! If you’re feeling bad about the investigation, don’t you dare show it!”

The door on the other side of the glass opens and an officer escorts Sasha in. She wears a grin on her face but has a wild look in her eyes. “Ahoy, me buckos! Worry ye not about me! My spirits be good and ol’ Prosecutor Nostache won’t keep me down!”

“Uh.” Athena blinks and turns to Phoenix. He shrugs. 

Sasha’s entire posture collapses. “Well that was an anchor,” she says. “Straight to the bottom. I wanted to make you feel better for all the trouble I’m causing…”

“We were hoping to cheer you up,” Athena says. 

“Maybe you both can just act natural,” Phoenix says. Not that telling anyone to “act natural” ever leads to any normal or natural behaviors. Certainly not if he ever told Maya that, though after the first time he learned to add the qualifier “act what might be natural for a human”. 

“Anyway.” Athena inhales deeply and the large, forced smile that she had put on calms down into something still friendly, still smiling, but closer to neutral, and much more natural. “What we’re here for, Sasha, is to tell you that we’d like to represent you in court tomorrow!”

“What!” Sasha shoves herself backward from the sill, her chair screeching horribly across the floor until it gets stuck, and she still pushing tips herself and the chair over backwards, thudding out of sight to the ground.

“Sasha?” Phoenix asks. “Is - is something wrong?”

She doesn’t stand back up. Athena pushes herself up on the sill and presses her forehead against the glass, trying to peer down to see if she’s okay. “Pros - Prosecutor Blackquil s-said--” Sasha’s shaking, shuddering breathing interrupts her words. “Said that you w-wouldn’t show up. You’d abandon me.” She’s definitely crying now, loudly and messily. “And you’re here! You - you’re - you’re h-here. To rescue me.” She rights the chair, rubbing tears off of her cheeks and out of her bloodshot eyes. 

“No, Sasha!” Athena still has her face up close to the glass and she presses her palms up against it, too. “We would never! Even Prosecutor Blackquill should know that! I would never! Don’t cry!” The next loud sniffling comes from Athena.

Oh boy. 

“These are happy tears.” And Sasha is smiling, beaming really, even blinking furiously to stop further tears from falling. “I’m so so glad I met you both! For Orla and me a-and—” Another shaky breath stops her for a moment. “Okay. I’m okay. I’m okay! You’ve probably got questions, right? Fire away!”

What she tells them of cleaning the orca pool that early morning is a review of what they’ve already heard, up to the point that she readily tells them she was arguing with the captain. She talks more about Orla’s tricks, says that the calendar with the seven am meeting with the captain is definitely not hers, and when they tell her that they dropped off her medications - it was Fulbright who tasked them with this, but it still had to be cleared with the prison so that they know no one is trying to smuggle in something illegal like white powder (Apollo is way too straight-laced for an Anything Agency and it’s hilarious every time he smacks inconsequentially up against that wall) - she starts getting weird. Like she’s trying to distract them from the fact that she’s on medication at all, which isn’t really working. “Are you sick?” Athena asks. “Is everything okay?”

“Oh, yeah, it’s all just peachy!” Sasha says with false, feigned cheer; the fact that she couldn’t drum up a fish pun to use really seals it. (Wait, isn’t a drum a kind of fish? Why’s he know more about fish than flowers? And seals - god damn it.)

Athena stares doubtfully at her. Her shoulders slump. “I guess I could just tell you, huh,” Sasha says. “It’s for a heart condition but—”

“A heart condition?” Athena cries, her voice high and shrill. 

“—but it’s not that serious—”

“Not that serious!” Athena’s second echo isn’t quite as much of a piercing shriek, but it’s even louder, an angry yell. “It’s your heart! Don’t tell me not to worry!”

Sasha heaves a sigh. “This is why I don’t tell people,” she says. “Because you freak, and then I’m trying to reassure you that you don’t need to treat me like I’m fragile, and I’ve got to explain that I’m not dying, so on, so on.”

“Oh,” Athena says. “I’m sorry.”

“Nah, it’s okay.” Sasha shrugs. “I’m sorry for snapping at you like that. It’s not you. It just gets a little tiring going through the same song-and-dance every time I tell someone. Much less fun than putting on the same song and dance with Orla every show!” Athena laughs and Sasha sticks her tongue out at her. “And I’d just had that argument with the captain the other night, too. The one that came up in the trial this morning. He knew about my condition, and I’d told him that I’d scheduled the surgery that would fix it, and he was worried and he told me that’d been thinking, and he was taking me out of the show. You saw the new flier, right? That I’m not in it?”

Phoenix nods. 

“And it was supposed to debut yesterday. But I needed to go out there and perform yesterday. It was the anniversary of Azura’s death, and I had this crazy idea that I would go in front of the audience and tell them all that her death was just an accident, that Orla didn’t kill her, and now the captain wasn’t going to let me out there. So what I did” - her smile is somewhere between devious and sad - “was move the skull rock from the show stage. Put it back in the orca pool, figured the captain probably wouldn’t look there, and if he couldn’t find the major prop for the new show, we’d have to do the old one again, right? Marlon gave me a hand with it, while he was watching Orla at the stage pool.”

It was a bold plan, is about all Phoenix can say to that. “Azura is the orca trainer before you?” he asks.

“Yeah. Azura Summers. She taught me everything I know - she was a year older than me and we were like - anemone and clownfish. Remora and shark!” Phoenix doesn’t speak marine biology but Athena is nodding in solemn understanding. “She was a year older than me. She was the best - you ever meet someone and just, hit it off immediately, you just know that they’re someone who’s gonna be so important in your life?” Sasha stares down at her hands, fiddling with something. “And then she was gone.”

“That must’ve been awful,” Athena says. “Losing someone you loved, and then having everyone else say that your friend was the one that killed her, and no one believes you when you know otherwise.” She sniffs again. Poor girl and her sensitive hearing and hyperempathy. 

Sasha nods. “Azura was like family, since my own family was never exactly supportive of my career path.” And not that Phoenix wants to downplay the severity of family disapproval, how much of a mess of hurt their influence can make, but he can’t exactly say he’s surprised to hear that a selkie’s family might think that her getting a career with an orca was bad news. “I can only imagine what they’re saying now after the captain’s death now too.”

He doesn’t want to pick at a reopening wound, but he never knows what strange little pieces of information will help, and so he asks, “Were you and Ms Summers - involved?”

“Huh?” Sasha blinks at him. A moment later the meaning clicks. “Oh! No, she was straight. She had a boyfriend that I never got to meet, but I’d help her send him videos of some of our orca-training sessions, because I mean, getting to see your cute girlfriend hanging with a cute orca, what could be better?”

“Toss a cute penguin in there too!” Athena suggests. “And then you’re golden!”

“Athena, I love the way you think!”

Phoenix clears his throat. Something more for his “legal etiquette Athena needs to learn” list: the detention center is not a place for hitting on people. Or maybe it’s more Sasha hitting on her. Or maybe they’re just like this. 

Sasha’s face falls and her eyes turn downcast. “She had this matching charm with her boyfriend that I’d wanted to return to him after she died, but I didn’t know enough about him to find him, so I just hung onto it myself. Swore on it that I’d become the best orca trainer ever, for her.” She holds up the charm; it hangs from a cord with a bead strung on it, and looks like a little talisman or envelope one would find at a shrine. “Just like the captain always used her walkie-talkie after that. It had teeth marks from Orla in it, when she brought Azura back up from the water…”

Jack Shipley’s death must be like reliving a nightmare for her.

(But also, remembering the photo of the body, Phoenix did not see a walkie-talkie in the victim’s holder for it.)

“Wait, you didn’t even see her boyfriend at her funeral?” Athena asks.

Sasha shakes her head sadly. “She didn’t even have a funeral. We held our own memorial for her at the aquarium, but her family just sort of - showed up and took her away. I’d suggested that we get an autopsy or something done, to know how she actually died and that it wasn’t Orla, but we needed her family’s permission for that and they wouldn’t give it.” 

Her face is turned toward them, and her eyes are, or should be, but she has the spaced-out look of someone not seeing what’s right in front of her. “They had this huge row with Dr Crab about something, too. I wonder if that’s part of what changed him. He and Azura were pretty close, and he started acting so different after she died - talking about how he was going to euthanize Orla, when before he said he’d never do such a thing. He thought she did it! He still always keeps poison on hand, ready to put her down at any moment! If she’d been found guilty today he would’ve just done it, right then!”

Phoenix has a very good idea of who they need to talk to again, next.

-

Back at the aquarium, they find Dr Crab in his laboratory, with Pearl, who is holding a furiously a squawking Rifle in her arms. “—correct, she does hate me. Since this little annoyance” - Dr Crab gestures at Sniper, who is for once free of the nest of his hair and waddling about the lab - “imprinted on me right out of the egg, she thinks I stole her baby. I didn’t want to steal her baby! But I guess she feels like the human parents of a changeling would.”

“That’s very sad for both of you,” Pearl says seriously. Rifle’s wings flap against her hands. “Your job involves inducing animals to vomit a lot, doesn’t it?”

The doctor snorts. “Today’s just been a hell of a day.” He squints down at the strange machine in his hand, something too boxy to be a regular tablet, with a small screen that flips back on a hinge. “Now let me see if I can find out when she ingested that foreign object.”

“Hi Mr Nick!” Pearls releases Rifle to the ground and the penguin makes an immediate beeline for Dr Crab’s shins. Absorbed in whatever he’s looking at on his machine, he doesn’t seem to notice. “Watch the penguin vomit! It’s for Sniper to eat!” She directs his attention to a pile of, yes, penguin vomit, that he doesn’t want to consider any further, but that Sniper is pecking at. “Mr Doctor told me that mama penguins partially digest and regurgitate fish for their babies to eat, because it’s easier for them to eat that mush!”

“You two seem to be getting along well,” Phoenix says. “You and Dr Crab, I mean.” They already knew that Pearl hit it off with Rifle, somehow. 

“Rifle ate something she shouldn’t so I was helping him get that out of her.” Pearl gestures now at the corner of one of the lab tables, where an object, familiar though it’s partially covered in mushed-up fish, lies. Phoenix takes a few more steps forward. The mess doesn’t smell as fishy as he expected, or perhaps he’s lost all sense of smell, and yes, whatever it is that Rifle ate looks a whole hell of a lot like the little talisman Sasha had, that once belonged to Azura. And there was supposed to be a second one, that Azura’s boyfriend had, wasn’t there?

“Excuse me, Dr Crab?” Phoenix says. He grunts. “Can we take a look at that charm that Rifle swallowed?”

He grunts again. Phoenix decides that’s a “yes”. Investigations don’t get anywhere fast, otherwise. He gingerly picks up the cord on the charm and lets it dangle. Yeah, that’s definitely the same thing as—

“Hey! What are you doing with that?” Dr Crab snaps out of his reverie, with all the anger of a man who’s only just realized something is happening that he would’ve liked to have stopped sooner. “Put that down! That’s Azura’s!”

Phoenix drops it back on the table. Dr Crab, with no regard for penguin barf, snatches it away. “What the hell was it doing in Rifle’s stomach?” He drops it back into the pocket of his lab coat.

“Would this one happen to have belonged to Azura’s boyfriend?” Phoenix asks. 

“I don’t make it a habit to discuss the affairs of the deceased! Especially not with you people!”

Bit of a fraught subject, there. Sasha did say that they were close. “Yesterday was the anniversary of her death, right?”

Dr Crab’s sigh sounds more like a growl. How close is Phoenix to being kicked out of the lab? “That’s right,” Crab says. “A year since the orca killed her.”

“You really think Orla did?” Athena asks. “I don’t believe it!”

“And I was there, Ms Lawyer. I saw Orla bite her. Maybe she didn’t mean to kill her, who’s to say - but what I do know is that Azura is dead.” The point he puts on his last several words closes down the topic even more firmly than his outraged yelling did. Satisfied that he’s shut Phoenix up - for the moment, because Phoenix refuses to be done until he’s run out of questions and he’s still got plenty - he returns to studying the data on his machine.

Who knows what might be important information for a trial? “So what’s that there?” Phoenix asks.

“Monitoring system. Collection of medical records for all the creatures. Between it and the cameras I can monitor them all constantly, twenty-four/seven. Company secret, that’s all I’ll tell you.”

“Really?” Phoenix asks. “Aren’t medical records just like - past exams and stuff? How can you get present, constant data from that?”

“Good point,” Crab says, after a slight pause. A sneered, thin smile stretches out across his face. “I can see there’s no fooling you.”

“Are you trying to fool me?” Phoenix asks.

The two Psyche-Locks that clang into place answer that question for him.

“You tell me,” Dr Crab says.

“Clearly,” Phoenix says.

“Excuse me, Mr Doctor?” Pearl asks. She scoops Rifle up into her arms to stop the penguin from resuming an attack on Dr Crab’s shins. “Mr Nick is a very good lawyer who always finds the truth but he needs to know everything he can to do so. Even if you don’t think your monitorings have anything to do with the case, it might be the information that Mr Nick needs to bluff himself into a better position to win!”

Dr Crab stares at Phoenix, his eyebrows raised. Phoenix wishes Pearl had found any other way to phrase that. “And it would be very kind and helpful of you to do,” Pearl adds.

The lab is far from silent - the hum and murmur of computers, Rifle’s struggles to break free and attack, Sniper eating, Athena cooing at Sniper. But it still feels quiet and empty as Pearl waits for any response and reaction at all from Dr Crab. He says nothing. She narrows her eyes, glancing from Rifle to the floor, like her next step in convincing him will be to sic a penguin on him.

Instead she simply readjusts her hold on Rifle, pulling the penguin up further in her arms, and says, much more seriously, no longer with any sort of pleading edge, “You asked for my help to examine Rifle and I gave it to you, remember? It was just a few minutes ago, right before Mr Nick came back, but I didn’t just offer that on my own.”

“Son of a bitch,” Dr Crab hisses. “That’s exactly what happened, isn’t it? I asked her if you could grab her for me and - damn, now I owe you, don’t I?”

He and Athena both glance over at Phoenix’s sharp intake of breath. Pearl doesn’t do this; she cares about human standards of fairness and tends to cancel debts made out of careless words of people who don’t know better and don’t know what she is. This situation, this case, she thinks is desperate. And Dr Crab saw what she is. It’s fair. 

Pearl, unblinking, hollow-eyed, nods. “And I think you should answer Mr Nick’s questions about your monitoring,” she says.

Dr Crab shakes his head. “Well,” he says. “Shit. I got careless and that’s on me - to the victor go the spoils. So if I answer whatever questions our Mr Lawyer here has about my monitoring equipment here, then we’re settled, yes? No debts after that.”

“No debts after that,” Pearl agrees.

They both wait for Phoenix to say something; it’s a bit tricky, he thinks, to follow up a top-tier negotiation such as Pearl’s. “So. Twenty-four/seven monitoring. How’s that work?”

“It’s an ecological data organization system developed in Europe. Teleobservation Realtime Pertinent Data Organizer, TORPEDO for short.”

Phoenix decides not to try and suss out how well that acronym actually fits it, and not just because the whole name has already been ejected from his brain and he couldn’t repeat it back if he tried. Tele-pertinent real-time data what? 

“It records information on its subjects constantly - heartbeat, vocalization, movements, temperature, and so on - through sensors placed on or near the subject. All that gets sent to me and my equipment here. Rifle has her sensor attached to her flipper ID tag.” Pearl takes Rifle’s wing in her hand and holds it out to examine the tag in question. “For Orla and the fish, it’s attached to the side of the tank. Now here we go, what’s it say about Rifle’s feeding?” Dr Crab glares down at the terminal in his hand. “Four am on the nineteenth is when she swallowed that. What a weird time. And - shit, Orla didn’t eat at all that night until the next afternoon.” He shakes his head. “What is going on here?”

“Maybe that’s why Rifle wouldn’t eat my fish but Orla would.” Athena sounds slightly cheered at the prospect that it wasn’t her causing personal offense to Rifle - Rifle just wasn’t hungry. 

Phoenix clears his throat. “Why keep it a secret?” he asks. “This monitoring system - it’s clearly helpful and it’s not like we’re competitors trying to come in and steal your secrets.”

“Let me preface this by saying” - nothing good ever starts that way - “that this system has been tested rigorously and approved as safe and legal in many countries. Just not this one.”

Ah, that would do it. “You’re breaking the law?” Athena asks, startled. 

Dr Crab grimaces but it ends as something more like a grin. “That’s why I keep this terminal with me at all times. Lucky, else the police might’ve been poking their noses into it yesterday. None of the rest of the crew knows - keeps them safe from the legal repercussions, but I had Jack’s permission for this. He felt, and I agreed, that giving the best care possible to our animals was more important than legality.”

“But - but you’re breaking the law! And that’s—” Athena sputters, searching for a solid objection. “That’s breaking the law!”

Yeah, she’s a smart kid but hopefully she’s not going into a trial without a co-counsel any time soon.

“And if breaking the law betters the lives of our animals? Are we supposed to just sit and wait for the law to change, when in the meantime we can have more information and act quicker to help them - to save their lives?”

“But…” Athena glances to Phoenix for backup she won’t find. Not that he’s not a hypocrite, but he’s not going to step into this debate just to be one. It’s disconcerting, again, every time he realizes that part of Athena’s admiration of him comes only from the fact that she doesn’t know him as well as Apollo does. She’s arguing against the logic that bore him his ace in the hole. And he can’t blame her; it took him a long, bad time to get there. “You’re just - twisting it around, now.” But she looks rattled, not sure how to square this away with the foundation of her career. 

“Dr Crab,” Phoenix says. “I might need to use this information in court tomorrow. But that would obviously cause serious problems for you and the aquarium.” He isn’t asking permission, but this isn’t quite an apology, either. It’s just a statement of what it is, regrettable, inevitable.

“You’ve gotta do your job, Mr Lawyer, and I do mine.” Dr Crab shrugs, more resigned than bothered. This must be a prescient concern, for however long it’s been since they installed this system at the aquarium. Maybe it’s even a relief by now, to no longer be hiding. “I stand by my convictions and don’t have regrets, and I hope you won’t, either. I can’t blame you, or her, for that.” He nods at Pearl. 

“I appreciate it.” Nice to not have a witness biting his head off, even if in this case it would be - not deserved, he’d like to think, but understandable. 

“Hmph. Any last questions on that or can I—”

A loud peeping begins, like the chirps Sniper made but louder and constant. Dr Crab frowns and slips a phone out of his pocket. “Hello? Crab here.”

 “That’s a ringtone?” Pearl asks. “That’s adorable!”

“I don’t think Maya’s gonna let you change mine,” Phoenix says to her. 

“I didn’t think that Dr Crab liked the penguins that much,” Athena whispers. “But I guess he’s just a big softie, really!”

Were he actually listening to them Phoenix has no doubt the doctor would consider those fighting words. As it is, his fighting words are for whoever is on the other end of the line. “Son of a bitch, you people again! What more do you—”

He storms from the lab and slams the door behind him. Athena looks at Phoenix. He nods. She creeps closer to the door to listen, crouched with her ear by the crack where it closes, though Phoenix isn’t sure she needs to be that close to actually hear. “He’s saying that Orla was found not guilty,” she says, “and that should be enough - stop harassing him, he knows that - if it comes to it he - Mr Wright!” She tried to spring back up but smacks her head against the bottom of the doorknob on her way up, and wincing and grumbling to herself, stands tall again. “He said - that if he has to he’d euthanize Orla!”

“No!” Pearl gasps. Rifle wriggles around in her arms and Pearl sets her on the table. “She’s not guilty! In a court of law! She can’t be punished!”

Knowing that the whole orca pool can function as a faery ring makes Phoenix even more nervous that she’s going to commit larceny as soon as anything starts seeming tense. Grand Theft Orca. This is not something he ever thought he would have to consider. 

The door swings violently inward, banging hard into Athena’s shoulder. She stumbles away, cursing under her breath again. Phoenix picks out pieces of several languages. (He really should ask her how to say “fuck you” in German. It would be funny.)

“Where’s my goddamn calendar?” Dr Crab storms back in, sweeping a dozen takeout containers from the desk in front of the largest screen into the trash can strategically positioned right next to it. A few fliers for the orca show drift to the floor. “Son of a bitch, where did I leave it this time?”

“Calendar?” Athena perks up. “It wouldn’t happen to be one of those cute penguin ones, is it? Mr Rimes found one in the nap room and—”

Dr Crab snatches it away from her and scans the mess of his desktop for a pen and scribbles something on it. “Yes, that’s mine. It was a gift, all right?” He sighs. “From Azura. She designed the calendars for this year and this was the prototype.”

“Oh.” Athena’s smile vanishes. And then, seeming to take a cue from Phoenix’s line of questioning of Sasha back at the detention center, she asks, “Did you and Ms Summers happen to be, erm, romantically involved?”

“Of course not!” He bristles at the suggestion, almost weirdly defensive, so while he sees no Psyche-Locks, Phoenix still won’t take it as the end-all-be-all. Maybe he’s defensive about the calendar for what’s written on it, that meeting with the victim at seven am. Could he, at that time, have committed murder? “Were I even so inclined to partake of ‘romantic feelings’” - he doesn’t make them with his hands but Phoenix can hear the air quotes - “I certainly would not involve myself with—” He stops. He glares at Athena and Phoenix in turn. “What business of yours is it, anyway?”

“I just heard a lot of sadness in your voice when you mentioned her, and the calendar,” Athena says. “And I wondered—”

“She was a good friend and now she’s dead, of course I’m sad!” Though he’s probably not sad now, just mad at them and their prying questions. “How can you possibly think that’s related to your defense of Sasha, or do you like using the excuse of being lawyers to pry into people’s personal lives?”

Seems like it’s time to redirect; this thread when pulled on isn’t going anywhere good. “Your phone call just now - what was that about?”

“Heard all that, did you now?” Dr Crab sighs. Phoenix skips the part where he clarifies that Athena did, because she has better hearing than the human and fae also in the room. “That’s the Center for Dangerous Animal Control, insisting that if Orla ever attacks anyone again, we’d better not bother with this rigamarole and just put her down immediately.”

“But that’s not fair!” Athena has her fists raised, ready to fight the shadowy specter of this vague organization. “Did you agree to that?”

Dr Crab is quiet for a very long time. “Sometimes,” he says finally, “unfortunately, things happen. As a veterinarian, I am prepared to do whatever needs to be done.”

“Sasha says you keep poison on hand to always be prepared to put Orla down!” Athena levels the accusation with fury that Sasha would be proud of. 

Dr Crab reaches into one of the pockets of his lab coat and pulls out a tiny plastic bag that contains within it a red and yellow capsule. 

One that looks exactly like that they found mixed in with the contents of Orla’s stomach.

Phoenix is very, very glad they didn’t show it to him. 

“That’s awful!” Athena says. “How dare you!” She’s livid enough that Phoenix isn’t sure she realizes this pill is like the other one, and while that’s something they’re going to have to work on - making sure she’s clear-minded enough to make all the connections that matter, for now she’ll have him or Apollo with her, and Phoenix is just glad she won’t blurt it out to Dr Crab. He wants to keep this one close to his chest until he sees the best opening to play it. 

“Sasha thought the same thing.” Dr Crab drops the pill back in his pocket. “When security around Orla was tightened last year, she insisted that I not be given a key card to access the orca pool room. Thinking, I imagine, that the chances of Orla having a medical emergency when either she nor Jack were here to let me in were lower than the chances of me doing something to her.” He huffs derisively, Athena still seething.

“Dr Crab, I have a last question for you,” Phoenix says. “This - Center for Dangerous Animal Control.” Or however the words were ordered. “Ms DePlume told me something interesting earlier today.” That the Center had made this same demand a year ago, and for some reason relented, but the aquarium has been making large monthly payouts to someone or somewhere ever since. Phoenix repeats this fact to Dr Crab’s expressionless face, and adds, “It’s clear that there’s something going on behind the scenes here, and I suspect that it has something to do with this murder.”

“Do you.” He’s good at responding by saying nothing, but any words at all are sometimes enough to trip the trap, let Phoenix know exactly how much a witness is hiding.

Five Psyche-Locks this time, the appearance punctuated a moment later with loud footsteps and a louder yell. “Dr Herman Crab! Sorry to interrupt, but Prosecutor Blackquill wants to speak with you!”

“Son of a—” Dr Crab punctuates his speech by smacking his calendar down hard on the the table. “What the hell else could you possibly have to ask me?”

“We were hoping to have Mr Rimes testify at tomorrow’s trial, but we’ve been having some trouble getting him to cooperate. As such, Prosecutor Blackquill would like to call you instead!”

“Hmph.” Crab takes a moment in which he clearly is sizing up and assessing Fulbright, deciding whether he can get out of this and if he wants to tangle with Blackquill in that way. Surprising that he didn’t manage to coerce (or threaten) Rimes into talking and has to go for a backup. “Fine. But I’m not giving my opinion on what happened. I’ll tell you what I know, but I’m not taking sides.” He turns to Phoenix. “Until tomorrow, Mr Lawyer.”

-

Neither Trucy nor Apollo notices when the office door opens. Trucy has her laptop in her lap and is furiously scrolling, glancing between the screen and the notebook Apollo is still trying to write it. It’s a silent and periodic scuffle between the two of them as Trucy grabs it and yanks it toward her to check something, and Apollo pulls it back to continue writing. Phoenix shudders to think how unreadable his handwriting is from this. “Commonly for a number of heart conditions,” Trucy mutters. “Is this relevant, Apollo?”

“Of course it is!” He reaches across her keyboard and turns her screen toward himself. “Go back to the book - the picture. If she had a heart condition and a physically intensive job—” He taps his pen against the screen. “There’s no visible injury, look, wouldn’t you think a killer whale could cause some damage—”

“Oh! You think that—”

“Yeah.”

“Hey, guys,” Phoenix says. “What are we working on?”

They shriek in tandem, Apollo flinging the pen and Trucy knocking the notebook to the floor and almost dropping her laptop. Athena claps her hands over her ears, belatedly, and braces herself against the doorframe. “Yes, we’re back now,” Phoenix adds. “What’ve you got?”

“First: the capsule!” Apollo moves his hand like he means to gesture with the pen to the capsule in a bag on the coffee table, except the pen is no longer in his hand, so he’s just sort of waving, and his voice still as enthusiastically loud as ever. “It’s a sleeping drug! That’s the brand name on it, ‘3 Zs’. The Shipshape Aquarium vet recently bought a bunch of it from Hickfield Clinic - it’s meant for people, but apparently would work on other mammals.”

“A sleeping drug?” Phoenix repeats. 

Apollo nods. 

That had been Phoenix’s first thought, when he first saw that capsule, but Dr Crab called it poison - sure, enough of it could certainly kill, but he’s a veterinarian. He’d be legally able to get some kind of actual euthanization drug instead of trying to overdose an orca on sleeping pills - if that was actually what he intended with it, and not something else. Why pretend it’s poison?

“And the other thing - Shipshape Aquarium had the woman who died last year, Azura Summers, right?” He doesn’t wait for Phoenix to confirm he knows and barrels on, “She was getting medication prescribed by Hickfield Clinic to help her manage a heart condition.”

“I found an illegal download of that writer lady’s book!” Trucy pipes up. Bless that girl. 

“A heart condition?” Phoenix can’t do much but echo right now, but his mind is racing. What was Apollo saying when they walked in? Jack Shipley removed Sasha from the show for fear that she would come to harm because of her condition - theoretically, that could’ve already happened. “Do you know what the medication she was on was called?”

“Uh…” Apollo glances down at his notebook. “I wrote it down? It’s like—”

Phoenix takes the notebook from him. The writing is exactly as messy as he imagined, jagged pen lines trailing off across half the page when Trucy grabbed it. “That’s the same medication that Sasha is taking,” he says to Athena. 

“So what’s that mean?” she asks. 

“I have no idea.” That’s a hell of a coincidence, but he doesn’t really see how it could be anything but an unfortunate coincidence, even as a man whose policy is to not believe in coincidences. Orla isn’t on trial now, and wasn’t on trial for Azura’s death, either, yesterday. But maybe this information could offer some reassurance, and closure, to Sasha and the rest of the aquarium crew. “But that capsule, now that’s something. Nice work, Apollo.”

Apollo gives Phoenix a wide-eyed, startled look. Has Phoenix really complimented him so rarely?

“Where’s Pearly?” Trucy asks. Her face falls. “Did she go back home already?”

“She’s staying at the aquarium to help out with Orla, with so many of the staff dragged out to testify and everything.” There she goes again, slotting herself perfectly, naturally, in somewhere, like she’s meant to be there, so that no one even questions letting a strange little faery girl in so far behind the scenes. 

The only thing to put him slightly at ease is that she said she would be ready to call in, from the aquarium, through video phone during the trial tomorrow, which holds the implication that she’s not going to spirit Orla off to the Twilight Realm in the middle of the night to keep her safe.

Though she didn’t promise for sure that she wouldn’t, so he should probably call her and extract that promise from her, before he ends up defending in a case of orca larceny. 

[klapolloao3]

by dakoolguy

The Adventures of John Phoenix is the adventures of John Phoenix my OC/self-insert he is Phoenix's nephew and the adventures he have on his way to becoming the greatest defense attorney who ever lived AKA Ace Attorney. (I will try to upload a new chapter daily if I can )

Words: 9638, Chapters: 8/?, Language: English

Fandoms: 逆転裁判 | Gyakuten Saiban | Ace Attorney

Rating: Teen And Up Audiences

Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, No Archive Warnings Apply, Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Major Character Death

Categories: F/F, F/M, Gen, M/M, Multi, Other

Characters: John Phoenix, Phoenix Wright - Character, Edgeworth, trucy, Carlos Flavioli, Damon Gant, Manfred von Karma, The Judge, The other judge, The Conductor, The Kidnapper, The other kidnapper, John Policeman, Merlin, Maya, Mia, Godot, Pearl, Steve, Bob, Lotta Hart, Karl von Karma, Franziska von Karma, Bethany Edgeworth, Mary Wright, Klavier Gavin, Benjamin Woodman, Trilo Quist, Ema Skye, Ron DeLite, Max Galactica, Matt Engarde, Shelly de Killer, Rhoda Teneiro, Lauren Paups, The Doctor, Farmer, Veteran - Character, God, St. Peter, The Cops, Ambulance guy, The Judge's sister, girls - Character, Apollo Justice, dakoolguy, The Janitor, Manfred von Robot, Angel guard, Pubic D. Fender, Mysterious Man, shadowy figure - Character, Phoenix Phoenix, Assassin, Dick Gumshoe, Principal Buddy Johnson, Winston Payne, Wilt Wally, John Dead, Larry Butz, The teacher John Phoenix punched, John Phoenix's father, Peasant Girl, Geese - Character, Phoenix Wright's magic badge, Satan, King Khurain, Queen Khurain, John Phoenix's motorcycle, John Phoenix's custom M16, The angel gun, Guard at the detention center, Other guard at the detention center, THIS IS THE END OF THE CHARACTER TAGS THE FOLLOWING TAGS ARE NOT CHARACTER TAGS

Relationships: John Phoenix/Rayfa, John Phoenix/Edgeworth, apollo/klavier, Phoenix Wright/Maya, Gregory Edgeworth/Bethany Edgeworth, Athena/guillotine, Franziska/Adrian Andrews, John Phoenix's father/Mary Wright, Public D. Fender/Other guard at the detention center, John Phoenix/Ema Skye, John Phoenix/John Phoenix's motorcycle, John Phoenix/John Phoenix's custom M16

Additional Tags: Drama, Mystery, Tragedy, Hurt/Comfort, Military, Suspense, Spiritual, Fluff and Angst, Angst, Angst and Feels, Adventure, Pyschic powers, Comfort/Angst, Light Angst, Heavy Angst, Angst and Tragedy, Angst with a Happy Ending, Friendship, Uncle and nephew - Freeform, Blood, Violence, shoot, gun - Freeform, kill, John Phoenix - Freeform, Crying, Men Crying, manly weeping, Manly Angst, Orphanage, Robots, Rebirth, rebirth as a robot, Heaven, escaping heaven, Canon, canonical work, Ace Attorney 7, John Phoenix is in Ace Attorney 7, Go to my bio on FFN and you'll find a petition, It has a a lot of votes, give me kudos, his inclusion is all but guaranteed, Original Character - Freeform, OC, Self-Insert, OC/Self-Insert

[kikiofthevast]

Fanfic I have downloaded on my phone

I do recommend all of these and read them fairly consistently.

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Sanders Sides

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A Lovely Night - Peter164

Summary:

Virgil has a boyfriend, a dramatic, over the top, self absorbed boyfriend. But his dad doesn't know. He asks for some help from a trusted adult. This trusted adult just happens to be his teacher. But it seems that there always has to be a secret boyfriend in the family when his dad starts dating.

Genre: Fluff and Smut

Ships: Prinxiety + Logicality

My Thoughts: Fantastic, and you can skip the smut chapters without missing anything. It's a good, pretty healthy, supportive romance on both ends and I love reading it, it's so nice.

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Powerless - patentpending (on Ao3) (Tumblr: @/impatentpending)

Summary:

“People like us,” Logan had once remarked to Virgil. “Are statistical anomalies.”

(Almost) Everyone in the world has powers. As for those who don’t, well, they’re such a small part of the population - only 0.04% - why would anyone care about them?

Ever since he realized what people mean when they call him Powerless, Virgil Sanders has tried to fight back against the system that oppresses people like him, Patton, and Logan. When Patton’s bakery is targeted in a hate crime, he finally snaps. With the help of a mysterious sponsor, Virgil becomes a villain, ready to remake a broken society. The only thing standing in his way is the world’s most Powerful (and infuriatingly charming) superhero: The Prince, who is hiding the fact that his gilded life isn’t as perfect as it may seem.

Genre: Angst

Ships: Prinxiety + Logicality (with background OC+OC)

My thoughts: Without a doubt one of the best fanfics I've ever read. The author likes to keep readers on their toes and surprise you around ever corner. Every part of the plot is well-executed and enjoyable, and you can feel the emotion of the characters.

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Horizons - triggermoreliketiger (I know they have a Tumblr but I don't know what it is)

Summary:

The life of Roman del Rey was planned to the bits. Born in a wealthy family he was supposed to take over his father’s business. His last moments of freedom? The journey abroad. He couldn’t have predicted that when he would come back, everything he knew was about to change.

On the opposide side of social ladder, the genius inventor- Logan Sanders was struggling to make it through another day. His only chance? Get himself a sponsor rich enough to fund another year of Logan’s work. He couldn’t know that his last chance would blew up right into his face.

Genre: Angst

Ships: Prinxiety + Logicality

My thoughts: Holy crap I love this fic so much you wouldn't even believe. I adore the way everyone is characterized and Virgil and Patton are probably my favorites on that front. Just go read it, you won't regret it.

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Patton's Break - Shay_Nioum (Tumblr: @/sidespromptblog)

Summary:

When Patton snaps one day, it directly affects Logan. A misunderstanding on Patton's part, and a broken heart on Logan's.

Genre: Angst

Ships: Platonic Logicality

My thoughts: I read this whenever I need to cry. It's such quality angst and I love it a lot. Logan is trying so hard, poor boi.

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Ace Attorney

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The Phantom's Curse - gen

Summary:

Everyone knows the story of the Phantom; usually mothers whisper it to their babies to get them to behave, or it's told around the campfires of travelers. What they don't know, however, is that it is very real, and the Phantom could be watching at any time, from any set of eyes.

Genre: Angst and Adventure

Ships: Wrightworth/Narumitsu

My thoughts: I'm a sucker for pirates. I love the way this fic was written and executed you you should go read it. Also: don't be me and waste time being suspicious of Kristoph because he ain't evil in this. Still a bit of an ass, though. All the references to the cases were nice and the whole plotline was just so fun and enjoyable.

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A Beautiful Thing - wrightgotwronged

Summary:

"The Girl was offering me a way out...and I was desperate enough to believe her,"

Private Inspector Phoenix Wright is given the case of a lifetime when the mysterious Dahlia Hawthorne walks into his office. With a missing girl and murder on his plate, Phoenix is caught in a whirlwind of confusion and deceit. His past coming back to haunt him in the form of the District Attorney doesn't seem to help either.

Genre: Angst and Mystery

Ships: Eventual Wrightworth (Brief Phoenix/Dahlia)

My thoughts: I adore this fic. It's got a good, substantial mystery, and though most people can predict some of the turns it takes, it's a fun ride and 10/10 would read again.

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Turnabout: Bloodline - MalikRuttingAssassinAss

Summary:

Chief Prosecutor Edgeworth collapses at work in the midst of a heated trial. What comes from his hospitalisation throws both his and Phoenix's worlds into mass confusion, exposing forgotten family secrets, a murder, and uncharted feelings.

Genre: Angst and Smut (with a side of Fluff and Comedy)

Ships: Wrightworth/Narumitsu

My thoughts: This is a fantastic storyline, Phoenix is also kind of an idiot for the first bit but it's still really entertaining and nice.

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The Turnabout of Hazakura - MalikRuttingAssassinAss

Sequel to Turnabout: Bloodline

Summary:

Losing patience with the so-called "gift" of his lineage, Miles Edgeworth, along with Phoenix Wright, seeks the tutelage of the Nuns of Hazakura temple. Whilst hoping to control his "gift" with a punishing endurance regime, a horrific murder is discovered within the Temple grounds, and the evidence points towards one person.

Genre: Angst, Hurt/Comfort, Mystery, and Smut

Ships: Previously established, also developing Phoenix/Miles/Simon

My thoughts: This fic is incredible and I agree with Miles on the reveal of a certain plot point, honestly. But the mystery is well-executed and I just love the inclusion of Shi Long Lang (even though I haven't played either of the Investigations games).

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sleep no more - prinsipe

Summary:

Blood is thicker than water.

Or: Klavier deals with the aftermath.

Klavier’s first memory of blood went a little like this: the turkey at the family dinner, the worn handle of the knife, and Kristoph’s brown hands.

In retrospect, it was those details that stuck out at him above all else—the family dinner, because it was the first and last of its kind, the worn handle of the knife because it made him think of how it looked like it was made for the grooves of Kristoph’s hands, and Kristoph’s hands because they moved in a way that made him think he was born for the kitchen, not the courtroom.

(Of course, as a child, it had slipped his mind that knives weren’t just used for cooking.)

Genre: Angst and minor Hurt/Comfort

Ships: Pretty Background Klapollo, implied past Daryan/Klavier

My thoughts: A very long but a very good fic. I love the way everyone is characterized, and honestly this is one of those stories that you get more out of it if you read it aloud. Klavier is just alone, and I love the way Apollo slowly helps him get back up.

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Damage Control - pantswarrior

Summary:

After an emotional reaction from Phoenix following Edgeworth's return, Prosecutor Miles Edgeworth chooses death in truth. Fortunately for Phoenix, he doesn't quite succeed - and both of them have to learn a few lessons about communication.

Genre: Hurt/Comfort

Ships: Wirghtworth/Narumitsu

My thoughts: This is such a good story, but things have to get worse before they get better so read the tags and proceed with caution.

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Lost in a Lie - court-ships (virtualbrownie)

Summary:

Miles Edgeworth learned to kill when he was a newborn, and he learns to love it at the age of six.

Genre: Angst and a bit of Horror

Ships: None

My thoughts: This is really dark, but I really like it and you should definitely proceed with caution. Warnings for character death, murder, animal death, and blood.

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Intermetamorphosis - Jessepinwheel

Summary:

Or: Five Times Miles Edgeworth Didn't Know What Was Wrong With Phoenix and One Time He Wished He Didn't.

Or: God dammit Phoenix, stop shoving evidence in criminals' faces, or at least invest in a recorder.

Or: The story where Phoenix dies, but that doesn't stop him from being an ace attorney.

Genre: Comedy and Angst

Ships: None

My thoughts: This story is ridiculous but it's the good kind of ridiculous. There's just something so bizzarely funny about this happening that you just laugh at Miles's ignorance. Okay, that sounds mean, but really Miles?

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Turnabout Santa Claus - lostangelssong

Summary:

A Christmas trial that could have been.

Genre: Comedy

Ships: None

My thoughts: It's literally just Miracle on 34th Street. That's all it is. But it's so gosh darn funny and ridiculous that I had to recommend it.

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The Rise and Fall of the Stalk Trucy Wright Club - SlashPrincess15 (slashprincess15)

Summary:

Trucy Wright is a weird girl who makes all sorts of claims that cannot possible be true, at least that's what her school's student population believe. It all changes however when she starts getting picked up from school again.

Genre: Comedy and Angst

Ships: None

My thoughts: Such a nice fic, honestly. It's pretty funny, and the interactions Trucy has with the people that come to pick her up are fantastic.

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The Realm - Farris

Summary:

It started off normal and innocent enough: a welcome home party for Iris.

But when a demon comes slashing through, bringing a world of ghosts and crazy with it, Maya Fey has no choice but to stand as Master to save her friends and restore balance to the Afterlife. Unfortunately, she's not Master yet. Nor is she sure she wants to be, given all that's happened to her and her family. Oh, and things only get worse when she discovers she must face a series of Trials to prove herself and her worthiness of said Master title.

Still very bitter about Kurain's role in DL-6, Miles Edgeworth finds himself having to come to terms with spiritual powers as he tags along to the realm between this world and the next. And then there are the monsters. And the gods, his father, and the Trials. Not to mention something is very much wrong with Wright... like the fact that he's not dead.

Genre: Action, Adventure, and Angst

Ships: None

My thoughts: Definitely in my top 10 favorite fics, if "A Beautiful Thing" is a 10/10, then this thing is off the scale. Also Gregory being a Good Dad™ deserves it's own book.

[maki0725]

Klavquill 1-3

ユガキョ続きです。今回は翻訳ツールに頼りまくりでした。LINE翻訳ありがたい…

The next part of Klavquill. In Japan, Work will be finished on December 28th, and it will be a public holiday from the 29th to January 3rd in many ways. They might have a drinking party for finishing work of the year.

*******

The evening of 28th December, the last work day of the year

Phoenix, Trucy, Athena, Ema, Simon and Klavier were drinking at WAA.

Phoenix said that it was really good that they all were able to have this year’s work done in good health though Apollo surprised them by his decision to stay Khura'in, so they would speak to him on Skype later.

Athena and Trucy shared Klavier their impressions of the Christmas concert, Klavier smiled “ You were so cute but too eye-catching... though Herr Edgeworth didn’t scold me since he had called for you”

Phoenix said that Edgeworth was indulgent to Trucy, Ema said in a stunned manner “I don't know who will go to listen to such a fellow at valuable lunchtime”

Suddenly Simon grabbed Ema by the collar and said “Silence, if you do value your life”

The place was hushed up, Ema shrugged up at the sight of his blazing anger.

“Uh...I’m sorry for making a fool of your precious girl, sorry Athena, I’ll take it back”

“Who are you apologizing to?”

Everyone there including Klavier thought that Simon had been angry about Athena, Ema couldn’t make out what he was saying at once. She finally said “I see...sorry, Gavin, is this okay?”

Simon released her, a little while later he left the agency apologizing he confused them bluntly. Klavier followed him in amazement making a short speech.

Everyone there couldn’t understand what happened but they looked through the window. Klavier was talking over Simon just ahead of the building.

Trucy said that Klavier looked crying, the others couldn’t see it but he seemed to be wiping his face with his hand. They stopped looking as Simon noticed and glared at them pushing Klavier on the back into an allay.

They were surprised and asked Athena if they were close, she said that she didn’t know but maybe Simon wouldn’t talk everything to her, they might be close.

They quickly put the Skype on Apollo, he was at work and said “Oh, didn't it be eight o'clock?” They explained what happened and it surprised Apollo very much.

“Oh, Blackquill did that...? And did Gavin cry? You're kidding, right?”

“I thought I was really going to be killed!”

“It was her, so that's all he would do, but if it were you, I think you might have been really beaten”

“Stop that! I'll die if he beats me”

“I'm really glad I didn't say rush things”

“Oh you’ll be okay daddy, the car gave you only a sprain”

Phoenix laughed saying he guessed so.

Ema picked up a can of beer and said “I was really scared! I can't do without a drink”, Nahyuta put his head out behind Apollo and asked “Didn't you say you were busy?”

Ema was flustered, “Let's see, a meeting for finishing work is a part of Japanese work, uh..."

“What do you have in your hand?”

Everyone looked at a can of beer in her hand.

“You seem to be quite free, come to Khura'in tomorrow”

“Yeah...”

“A new year in Khura'in is rather good”

They continued drinking for Ema’s pep rally in

a bit of a weird atmosphere, Athena said that she would call Simon later.

******

12月28日夜、なんでも事務所にて仕事納めの飲み会

参加者は成歩堂さん、ココネちゃん、みぬきちゃん、牙琉、ユガミ、茜ちゃん

今年も一年お疲れ様、今年はオドロキくんがクラインに行っちゃうというまさかの大事件があったけどとりあえず無事に仕事納めできて良かったね、後で彼にもスカイプする約束してるから、という所長

とってもステキでした！とクリスマスコンサートの感想を牙琉検事に伝えるみぬきちゃんとココネちゃん

「キミたちすごく可愛かったけど、一瞬でバレたよね。…局長もお嬢さんに声かけてたみたいだから、怒られなかったけどさ」

「御剣もみぬきに甘いな…」

「御剣さんのところに行ったら絶句してました…」

「せっかくの昼休みにこんな奴の歌聞きに行く人の気が知れないわ」と言った途端にユガミに胸ぐらを掴まれる茜ちゃん

「黙りな。…命が惜しけりゃな」

その場は静まり返って、何が起きたのか分からないまま、ユガミの目に燃えるような怒りを見てすくみ上がる茜ちゃん

「分かったわよ、あなたの大事な子をバカにしてごめんね、取り消すわ、希月さん」

「誰に謝ってるんだ？」

牙琉検事含めて誰もがココネちゃんのことだと思っていたのに、唖然とする一同

「え……？なに……わ、分かったわよ！悪かったわねジャラジャラ、これでいいの？」

手を放して、一呼吸おいて「邪魔したな」と出て行くユガミ、呆然としていた牙琉検事が我に返って「ぼくも行くね、今日はありがとう！」とユガミを追いかけて出て行く

皆は何が起こったのかよく分からずにいるけど、窓から下を覗くと少し先で牙琉検事がユガミに追いついて、話をしている

みぬきちゃんが「あ…ガリュー検事さん…泣いてるみたいです…」

皆はよく見えないけど、牙琉検事が手で顔を拭っているような仕草は見えて、ユガミが窓から見られてるのに気づいたらしく事務所の方を睨んで牙琉検事の背中を押して路地に入って行ったので窓から離れる皆

「 えっ何どういうこと？」

「あの二人仲いいの⁉︎ ココネちゃん知ってる？」

「いえ聞いたことはないですけど…でも…夕神さんだって何でもかんでもわたしに話す訳じゃないと思うんで…もしかしたらそうなのかもしれないです」

とりあえずオドロキくんに話そう、とスカイプを繋げる皆

「あれ？8時じゃなかったでしたっけ？」

オドロキくんは仕事中

「オドロキさんちょっと聞いてくださいよ！」

状況を説明する皆

「えっ？ユガミ検事が？それでもって牙琉検事が泣い…？牙琉検事がですか⁉︎ ええ⁉︎」

「アタシほんとに殺されるかと思ったんだから！」

「いや〜茜ちゃんだったからあれくらいで済んだけど、オドロキくんだったら本当にぶん殴られてたんじゃない？」

「やめて下さいユガミ検事に殴られたら死んじゃいますよ！」

「ぼくもウカツなこと言わなくてほんとに良かったと思ってるよ」

「パパなら大丈夫だよ！車にはねられてもネンザだけだったし！」

「はっはっは、そうかもね」

「あ〜怖かったわ飲まなきゃやってられないわね」

「おや、あなた忙しいとのことではありませんでしたか？」

ひょっこり顔を出すナユタ

「えっ…えーとこれは…仕事納めは日本の仕事の一環で…」

「その手に持っているのは何ですか？」

缶ビールをチラ見する皆

「随分とヒマなようですね、明日クラインにおいでなさい」

「ええ…」

「クラインのお正月も良いものですよ」

「……」

とりあえず茜ちゃんの壮行会として、若干変な空気ながら続きを始める皆、後で夕神さんに連絡してみます、というココネちゃん

[lemedy]

HOLY SHIT, LEMEDY’S FINALLY PLAYING SPIRIT OF JUSTICE: CASE 2, PART 1

The second that Trucy was up there on stage I thought ‘I am calling it, I am calling it right fucking now, baby Wright girl is going to be accused of murder because frankly, she hasn’t had her turn yet. I WAS RIGHT. BABY WRIGHT GIRL IS ACCUSED OF MURDER.

This game is dragging me, kicking and screaming, into the Gramarye family drama again and look, I love and adore Trucy but I do not give a single shit about the Gramaryes and their fuckery. I realise that Capcom is trying to recreating the Fey clan drama that spanned multiple games, but the trick with that was that the Feys were actually INTERESTING, I gave many fucks about Mia, Maya, Dahlia, Iris and Pearl. Infinite more fucks. Jesus, please spare me from more ‘I WILL MURDER FOR THE ULTIMATE MAGIC TRICK’, we’ve done this before, and I’m legit disappointed we’re going here again.

(If the game is revisiting the Gramaryes to finally reveal to Trucy and Apollo that they are siblings, all will be forgiven)

Athena and Apollo going to Trucy’s show!! Supporting her!! Cheering for her!! I love this little trio so much, and I am very happy and greedy that Capcom is giving this to me. Athena and Trucy teaming up to eternally pick on Apollo is just. JOY. IS WHAT IT IS.

Also appreciate the kids talking shit about their boss behind his back: ‘TROUBLE’S DRAWN TO HIM LIKE IRON FILLINGS TO A MAGNET’. Harsh, Apollo. NOT UNTRUE, THOUGH.

TRUCY CRYING BECAUSE SHE’S SCARED AND DOESN’T KNOW IF SHE RUINED EVERYTHING AND ACCIDENTALLY KILLED A MAN. It fucked Apollo up, it fucked me up. Because it’s so well-established that the most important thing to Trucy is to always keep a smile on her face, so her breaking down? SHE IS NOT DOING SO WELL. PLEASE, APOLLO AND ATHENA. SAVE TRUCY.

Robert Downey Jr is freaking me the hell out.

EMA’S BACK. And I got really fucking hyped to see her interact with Athena, even if it was only a little bit. And as much as I loved cranky jaded Ema in AJ, it’s legit nice to see her happy and smiling and finally, a forensic investigator. SHE GOT THERE. GOOD JOB, EMA.

(I will also sell part of my soul to hear her talk about Lana. HOW IS LANA DOING)

Interesting little bit about Edgeworth ‘reorganising the prosecutors’ office’, and getting rid of corrupt prosecutors. Not sure if that’s a throwaway line that’s there just to give a reason for the new prosecutor to show up, or if that’s going to be an actual plot in the game.

(Another thing I would sell a bit of my soul for: wacky times in the prosecutor’s office. Edgeworth, Simon, Klavier, Fran. All disasters. All together. FUN FOR ALL).

Okay, so with ‘Bonny’: I’d convinced myself immediately ‘she is either the murderer or in on it’, but then we talked to her and she seemed legit nice and caring and helpful. But then we overhear her and Robert Downey Jnr talk and she’s kind of terrible and evil and PLOTTING AGAINST TRUCY, THE GREATEST SIN OF THEM ALL and….I’m not sure why the game decided to reveal this hand so early? I’m not sure if I would have rather seen her inevitable breakdown on the witness stand before she reveals her true colours, so….idk. Not sure if I love the whole ‘eavesdropping reveals she’s evil after all’. Unless there’s some other plot twist coming.

APOLLO DOES NOT WATCH POPULAR TV, HE’S TOO BUSY READING MANGA AND DOES NOT HAVE TIME FOR YOUR GAME OF THRONES, YOUR BACHELOR, YOU’RE THE WALKING DEAD.

(Not see: that one season that Klavier did the Bachelor. It was weird time).

Apollo is scared of heights and Athena holds his hand like the bro she is. Good job, Athena. Protect the baby chicken lawyer.

‘YOU GET AWFULLY PRICKLY WHEN IT COMES TO GAVIN’…Apollo is being awfully catty about Klavier. I can only assume that Klavier drank the last of this morning’s milk and put the empty carton back in the fridge, or forgot to clean the cat’s litter box, or left the iron on. Apollo is a cranky boyfriend today.

‘YOU’RE LOOKING UP MICROAGGRESSIONS LATER, APOLLO’. ATHENA, I LOVE AND ADORE YOU. THAT’S RIGHT, DON’T TAKE THAT SHIT FROM BABY CHICKEN LAWYER. EDUCATE HIM.

And then there’s a legit nice moment between Apollo, Athena and Nick (WHILE THEIR OFFICE IS BEING REPOSSESSED), and I tend to have a slightly darker view of the Phoenix/Apollo relationship a lot of the time….but a nice scene is a nice scene, and I do like seeing that Boss Lawyer trusts his kids enough to not only run things, but also to take care of his daughter. A good moment.

(The dad nearly getting executed in Make Up Foreign Land, the daughter being arrested for murder. GOOD TIMES IN THE WRIGHT FAMILY. MILES, WHAT IS HAPPENING WITH YOUR HUSBAND AND DAUGHTER).

[benjaminhunter]

T, U, V

under the cut for length!! ty for asking !!!

T - Do you have any hard and fast headcanons that you will die defending?

fast and hard headcanons, huh.. you’ll notice how my vocaloid hcs are short because i have so much of them but i don’t want to list them all.

(voca) 

all vocaloids know sign language

rin & len kagamine are both genderfluid and most vocaloids/utaus are pan, no one is straight (god forbid);

lui hibiki has aphonia and ring suzune is Deaf

v flower is agender and refers to themself with they pronouns and gendered terms like “Im fuckboy??” or “im just some country girl”

v3 & v4 flower are selective mute

fukase has a skin picking disorder

miku append solid has an eating disorder  (just a heads up i don’t want to treat this as a cute headcanon like an accessory or a fashion statement, its literally headcanons because i project myself on characters i love the most ! ok !)

miki is an alien, can float, makes funny beeping noises when excited

ia is an alien, can float

piko has prosthetic legs

gakupo is a gay trans man

sachiko is a trans woman

all len units are big narcissists and want to date each other somehow

yuzuki yukari is a lesbian

yuzukari on is good at video games, yuzukari lin is not

anon and kanon both are flirty jerks and woo all the girls (especially rana)

OTOMACHI UNA LOVES DRAGONS

cocorobo eats dirt. she straight up sucks dirt

(dr) 

komaru wears socks in bed (and during sex hfsdhskdfjsds); 

touko smacked mitarai in the face once; 

shsl impostor is nonbinary; AI nanami isn’t a different person from dr3 nanami but in fact nanami reincarnated;

when tenko held hands with a girl for the first time she had to lie down for twenty minutes and broke down crying in Gay Joy 

(lok) 

kuvira has a swarm of beauty spots on her stomach and hearing the name beifong associated with her makes her skin crawl; 

kuvira fell in unrequited love with korra and probably will always be in love with her, always there for her if she needs a hand, mako-style

lin was married to another woman and is a widow now

bolin and opal’s kid is an airbender

when katara dies, bumi didn’t make it in time to see her one last time and he has to live with that guilt for a while and disappears in the spirit world for like. two years; and then asami and korra go look for him because Bumi Is Their Friend? and a sweetheart

rohan is gay

(aa)

phoenix is bi, maya is bi, edgeworth is gay, mia is bi, athena is pan, apollo is bi, trucy is gay, klavier is pan, ema doesn’t care, rayfa is Fucking Gay My Dudes, nahyuta transcends gender and is bi, simon is gay

kristoph isn’t all black. he’s terrible and murdered people but my hc is he didn’t physically / mentally abuse his brother like so many think he did

hc that manfred von karma is mentally ill (ocd ?) and while that doesnt excuse his actions, its one of the reasons he put his children through so much abuse

i ship cy/ke/squill in a weird way, in the way that they adore each other, they require physical touch (like athena needs to rub her head against simon’s shoulder) and could sometimes kiss yeah,and they sometimes speak in unison and if asked, they’d probably marry each other, but they aren’t in love?.. they don’t.. have romantic love? platonic love only. if that makes sense

rayfa is smitten with trucy and maya.

wow lana and angel are still dating after all these years

lana and simon are buddies. aura and lana… hooked up also

(plvsaa) 

layton and phoenix flirted. it’s canon. it happened

darklaw’s scar on her right hand comes from when she dragged espella away from the belltower the night of the Great Fire; 

rouge & foxy are dating, rouge & barnham are cousins, darklaw is related to aura & simon blackquill,

espella and maya dated in the past, 

espella is a lesbian, rouge is bi, barnham is bi, eve is bi (leaning more towards girls)

darklaw has avpd and is psychotic

espella is Not Neurotypical (ptsd / psychotic) + suicidal (!she has all my Mental Illnesses because i said so) and this one headcanon i’ll fight for it in your local supermarket parking lot

(zero escape)

diana, phi and sigma all live in a big apartment after ztd; its strange because they’re technically all related to each other but they’re all the same age so sometimes they get really drunk and then diana is like “fuck im supposed to be the mom” and then passes out

diana and sigma don’t get together asap because theres a lot of dancing around and phi watches them with a quirked eyebrow over the breakfast table because they both are So Straight it’s annoying

eventually sigma builds Luna and the four of them live together and it’s actually a Lot Easier to live with such a positive presence who’s here to comfort them

SIGMA PINCHES DIANA’S CHEEKS EVERYDAY AND HE SQUISHES PHI’S CHEEKS WHEN SHE LOSES AT MARIO KART, DIANA PINCHES PHI’S CHEEKS AND LUNA WILL PINCH SIGMA’S CHEEKS. THERES A LOT OF CHEEK PINCHING

phi drags luna to a bar once and tries to get her drunk or just see if a GOLEM can dysfunction with alcohol but mostly its just phi downing shots of vodka while boys and girls come to flirt with luna

carlos explains to akane he’s dating someone, akane is overjoyed and want to meet them, and almost drops to the floor when she sees carlos is dating her brother aoi   (junpei laughing in the distance)

sean jOINS A CIRCUS

mira actually kills eric. sorry eric. She then goes to follow sean around while he’s following the circus. they adopt gab

eric isn’t actually dead but he’s away from mira because them being married is an horrible idea. What The Fuck Was Kotaro Uchikoshi Thinking

tenmyouji is Cool Grandpa and quark is good at soccer (???)

alice and clover are dating

U - Three favorite characters from three different fandoms, and why they’re your favorites.

lin beifong, because she’s lin beifong, thats why. touko fukawa because shes so strong, you know. v flower because… i really love flower’s voice and design and to this day they help me figure my gender out

V - Which character do you relate to most?

kuvira. has ambition but crippled with visions of grandeur and recklessness, full of regrets and bitterness and knowing she betrayed someone, all the while burying deep abandonment issues inside of her. damn.

[saltwaterships]

Characters: Klavier Gavin, Vera Misham

from Ace Attorney

I’ve never done one of these proper fic posts, but I’d really like to elaborate on this idea so I think I’ll give it a try.

I feel like Klavier’s characterization was a let-down in so many ways. After playing around with ideas from the Drew Misham case, I thought about Klavier. He seems really cool and composed in the game (mind you, its been a while since I played it) and it just didn’t sit right with me. I wanted to write a fic that expresses Klavier’s feelings properly, regarding the end of AJ.

I wrote this around Vera bc I love her, and love writing about her experience. This fic actually came about because I love thinking about new ways to tell her case so I felt it necessary to include her. Not sure how long this will be, or how many characters I will add in. I definitely fell in love with the idea of Vera and Klavier supporting each other and being able to talk to one another.

Hope you enjoy!

It was a difficult time in the life of prosecutor and rockstar, Klavier Gavin. He was in the process of questioning all of his relationships,  He couldn't have known his brother would do something like this? His own bandmate? That's one story, but his brother- who he had known all his life, was another. He felt guilt and fear and he felt abandoned. But he himself could not say what he felt because he felt too much all at once. How could he forgive his brother? Was it his fault? Something he could have done? Could he have changed the future?

How would Klavier continue his life? He had money, which was a great start. Fans, fans, people were generally friendly to him, he did not lack an abundance of admiration or wealth. What he lacked was maybe love, maybe it was true friendship, and he had done well without it until this point. He felt like he was at an end, he really couldn't end his life but he could not imagine his life continuing. What was in store for him? He had made many accomplishments in his life, two of his biggest turned out to be the cause of much horror.

He almost didn't want to hear other people talk. Didn't want to talk to people, for the first time in his life. What his brother had done was awful and he was awful for sharing his name. He wanted people to forget who he was, if anyone would talk to him he would like them to treat him like someone who was not related to a murderer. But how could he ignore what his brother had done? Why should anyone? At the same exact time he believed people should treat him awful but they should also treat him like he was not significant at all. What a selfish prick.

It was about his feelings now. What didn't he feel? But what did he feel? He didn't want to know what he felt, he would never figure it out, anyways. He was distraught, he was angry, he was sad, but he didn't feel an ounce of it.

Did he get help? Yes. Did it take time? Yes. It took him long enough to reach a point of stability. How he felt now took him back to the days before therapy, before medication. He was a burden, selfish, jealous, he was (not his words) a monster. Deep down he knew he wasn't really all these things, he was a lovable human being, and he, himself was loving. He cared for people and he cared so much, he cared  more than anyone else could ever know. And at this extent, he felt anger, sadness and jealousy in similar intensities. And now it was all coming back. The worst he had ever been.

Just as he thought his entire life was up in smoke, he remembered the victim. He was sorry for the him; Klavier knew that Drew Misham's life was not the easiest but felt a little comfort knowing the man truly cared for his daughter. Everything he did was to benefit her well-being. And how did her life turn out? Who would she become? If she survived, that is.

Klavier's attention shifted to the girl. Would it kill him to pay her a visit? No, not at all. Although, it could make him feel worse. But he wouldn't die. It would be fine. Or maybe it wouldn't, he just needed to go. Her life was in his hands now.

He arrived at her hospital room the next day. He realized he could have been too late but he was a sour piece of shit anyways. The nerve of him. A young woman's life was in danger and he – just forget it. He was here. He was beat to the punch by Phoenix, Apollo and Trucy. It wasn't a competition. In reality he knew he was not responsible for this girl. He knew it somewhere deep down. He could not find it at that moment. He did not know.

As he looked at her, his heart pounded. Memories came flooding back; emotions he tried so hard to keep away. Fuck it all. He wanted to leave. He wanted to leave. He was leaving. He was leaving. He was responsible for this. Why wasn't it him in this hospital bed? Why was he lying to himself. He had it good compared to her. He had it bad, but she had nothing. She had some things but she didn't have the things he had. She would have to start her life over. His was ending. Maybe he was responsible for this after all. Maybe he should stay.

So he sat himself down on a chair next to her bed. He put his head in his hands as if to keep his emotions at bay. He was kidding himself but he did it. He was actually a wreck but he soon learned that if he didn't look at the girl and pretended he wasn't in a hospital bed, he still felt like crap but he didn't feel guilty. What a faulty human being. Waste of space.

He must have been sitting there for hours. Well, five minutes. He finally looked at her again. She was awake. She was looking at him, possibly staring. She closed her eyes again. She must have hated him. He felt sick. He wanted to disappear.

“Look, I'm sorry.” He worried he sounded too aggressive. Maybe he was being too passive.

She nodded her head and said, “It's okay.”

He wanted to scream.

“I did awful things. My brother did awful things.” He knew he was calm this time.

She looked at him briefly. She looked away as her eyes teared up.

“I'm sorry.” He repeated.

“Mhmm.” All he could hear was her heavy breathing and her hidden tears.

What on Earth would he give to make her suffering go away? She didn't deserve this. But he didn't know what to do. She wasn't immediately impressed by who he was, nor was he being very charming at that moment. He was an ordinary, an ordinary Joe. To her.

“I didn't want to make you feel bad, Vera.” He said it. Her name. It was one of the most painful things he ever had to say. Not that he had to. “I feel bad.” He paused, he didn't want to repeat himself a million times. He came here to talk to her. But he felt disconnected from her. He didn't want to touch her shoulder or her hand, he didn't think she would like it if he got any closer. He wasn't exactly comfortable, with their distance they may as well have been on opposite sides of the room. “Vera, do you understand me?”

“Yes” She barely looked at him. Poor girl. “It's not your fault.” She sounded insincere from trying to be nice. Maybe she meant it.

But it worked for Klavier. He believed her.

“Vera, I think I know, I know it's not,” He placed his hand on her bed, “but this,” he cleared the tears in his eyes, “is painful for me. It's painful for you. I don't want you to feel this pain.” Klavier took his hand in hers, not sure if she would be comfortable with it. He should have asked.

“It was scary.” Vera looked him in the eye for a short moment, but it meant the world to him. He saw her pain, it made him want to heal her. Healing her would be the first step to healing himself. It sounded selfish but they both needed the same thing.

“You are a brave girl.” He let go of her hand. He wanted to cry but he didn't. He was coming back to his normal self. For a bit. “I want to know if you know what to do when you leave here.”

Vera looked thoughtful for a second, “what do you mean?”

“Where are you going to live?”

“Oh, I have a home.” He couldn't read her.

“Aren't you afraid?”

“He's gone, isn't he? .....I'm sure he is...” The amount of fear she showed was horrifying to Klavier. That was his brother, and although she was definitely right to be afraid, it hut him. He hoped to get over it.

“I promise that he is gone. There is nothing to be afraid of anymore.” He felt silly for pursuing. But what if he could really help this girl? He looked Vera in the eye, trying to get her to look back but it was fine either way. “Vera, are you afraid of me?”

She shook her head. She couldn't say, though. Did he scare her? She was always afraid these days and knew it wasn't only him. “No” Although, was he here to torture her?

“Vera...” He worried when he saw her expression, it was like she was lost, a bit like if the world around her wasn't real. But she was living through the unfortunate consequences. “I think you....you need a bit more time...” He brushed his fingers across his face to wipe away his tears as subtly as possible. It hurt him to see her that way, but he was sure now that he really wanted to help her. He was afraid of doing something out of pity but this was a girl in great need of help; she just lost her dad, she had no one in her life. Maybe she had money, she had a home, and Phoenix and the others would care for her, no doubt. But he didn't think it was enough, he had, the kind of help she could not get from all that.

Vera looked at him, unsure of what to say. She didn't understand what he meant but she didn't want to ask for many reasons. If she was going to die, well it was the best time for it. As for him being with her, she didn't get why he would show up. She was happy, but a little uncomfortable, it was fine.

He was afraid of being too pushy and he wondered if she wanted his help at all.

[wardencommanderrodimiss]

Witches, Chapter 10: living with the ghosts of who you could have been, a how-to guide.

This is a 13,000 word chapter because that’s just how it is now.

[Seelie of Kurain Chapter Masterlist] [ao3]

[Witches Chapter Masterlist] [ao3]

----

People Park sits right near the office, but even in the time it takes to bike there Apollo always expects to get hit by a car. Something about Phoenix’s experience, and the fear that Apollo is nowhere near as lucky as him, still hasn’t left his head. But as he always has, he makes it safely through the gates and rolls down the paved path. People are always scarce here - though Phoenix said once it’s funny that the park has become less shady now that the mob has a financial interest in it - but the late afternoon sunshine means that along with the people simply passing through it on the way to another destination, there are a few joggers and a few more dog owners. 

Apollo steers himself into the grass and hops from his bike, scanning the area for a particular dog. Unless she’s just wandered off - which is always very possible - she should be easier to spot than Klavier. (In what world is a cursed fae dog more visible than a rock star? In this world that Apollo has to live in.)

Vongole is a bright white, vaguely dog-like shape lying beneath one of the trees, but only after several blinks can Apollo figure that maybe, without her, he might recognize the blond sitting on the grass next to her as Klaver. Her red ears snap to attention when she spots Apollo and she rises to her feet, but not with a movement that any animal should or could make. She doesn’t propel herself up from the ground with her legs, which would give her some forward motion, but drifts up like she is attached to strings that were yanked straight upward, with legs solidifying beneath her.

Her tail takes a distinct shape to wag, smacking Klavier in the face on each swing. He doesn’t look up right away, and Apollo falters, not certain that Klavier didn’t catch a glimpse of him and deliberately ignore him. Vongole’s tail continues swishing and Klavier finally puts up his hand to block it and lifts his head, visibly annoyed, about to scold her - and he looks where she’s looking, at Apollo, and brightens, instantly, a surprised-but-delighted grin stretching out across his face. “Herr Forehead! What a surprise to see you here!”

“I work literally a block away,” Apollo says. Klavier can’t actually be surprised, and while he doesn’t see any red, his eye only sometimes pings sarcasm and hyperbole.

“And you could easily have just gone on home,” Klavier replies. That’s true, somewhat; Apollo could look at him and forget he’s a celebrity, right now. Not just because he’s sitting in the dirt in a mafia-funded park with his hair barely brushed and held together with an actual rubber band, but as a glamour. He hasn’t disappeared, entirely, faded like a ghost into the scenery, but he’s projecting the image of someone normal, someone who doesn’t merit a second glance.

Apollo doesn’t like not being able to trust his own eyes, when it comes to Klavier, but the magatama feels like an intrusion, so he’s damned either way. He leans his bike against the side of the tree and sits down near Klavier.

“Yeah, but between the typo-laden texts and you being here right by the office, I wasn’t sure if that was all a cry for help or what.”

Nothing said straight-out, because Klavier is only straightforward professionally, not personally. But the calendar, the bakery, the park, and that Apollo knows from prior conversations that Klavier usually doesn’t leave the office until at least six - the evidence leads to a logical conclusion, one that any jury would agree with.

Klavier raises one eyebrow - Apollo’s never figured out how to move them that independently, but that could be glamour, too - and taps a pink pen against the notebook that sits in his lap. “You mean you thought it was me playing coy about wanting to see you, ja?” he asks. The grin on his face now is different, hollower, not pushing his cheeks the whole way up to his eyes.

“No,” Apollo says. “That is absolutely not what I meant.”

“It’s what I would be asking, were I in your place,” Klavier says, but his grin snaps away. Apollo prefers that, feels less like he’s talking to a mask. He gets that feeling with Trucy too, sometimes. 

“That’s because your ego is the size of the sun and just as gaseous.”

“You wouldn’t go wrong having an ego like that.” Klavier leans his head back against the tree and glances at Apollo from the corners of his eyes. “It would fit your name.”

“I didn’t know you knew my name,” Apollo says.

“Of course I do,” Klavier says, though in Apollo’s opinion he’s overestimating himself with the of course. 

“How was I supposed to know when you never once used it?” Apollo asks.

“Your name is on the docket for the court cases,” Klavier says. “And in the letter of representation that Fräulein handed me just beyond the gate, there.” He points to the other entrance of the park, the one near which the noodle stand spent three days sinking into the grass, covered in police tape. Frowning still, his eyes return to meet Apollo’s. “I didn’t know what to make of you that day. I thought perhaps you were corrupt, and that by letting you onto the crime scene you would try something, and Fräulein Detective would chew your head off as she had been mine, and I would have my answer as to what happened on that day with my brother.”

The admission doesn’t hurt but does come as a surprise, given the hand of kindness that Klavier offered him so soon at the end of that trial. “And then you proved yourself to be rather honest, and far too normal, and I still did not know what to make of you but I thought I knew what to make of your place of employment, some sort of fae snare - and I was wrong, again.” He closes his eyes and turns his head away. “I suppose I still don’t.”

And Apollo doesn’t know what to say to that, certainly didn’t expect the conversation to take such a turn when Klavier started out by dodging Apollo’s attempt to scratch beneath the surface. “You thought I was normal even though I can see when people are lying?”

“Mm.” Klavier draws out the hum for a while. “I suppose my perception of such things is rather unbalanced. But compared to the Fräulein next to you, and your boss, yes, you seemed mostly normal.”

“I didn’t know what to make of you either,” Apollo admits. “I mean, I definitely didn’t think you were normal” - Klavier laughs - “but that you were the prosecutor and willing to - to help my case, for the sake of finding the truth - that, I didn’t get.”

And he’d been unhappy with it, at the time - unhappy with the flashy fae-seeming prosecutor pitying his case and lending his assistance. Unhappy that he couldn’t win on his own. It’s petty now, remembering, even if he understands where those emotions came from, and so he leaves that out.

Klavier hums again, still looking off at anything that isn’t Apollo. Vongole chews on a rock. Somewhere in the distance, past the traffic, Apollo would swear he hears Eldoon’s harmonica. “It was a fortunate coincidence that you and your office happen to be out this way,” Klavier says quietly. “What I was - it was simply for the bakery. Or not simply, but—” 

He’s about to say more but doesn’t, instead pressing his fingers to his eyes and pulling up his knees so he can rest his head on them. “Are you okay?” Apollo asks. He knows the answer when he asks this time, too.

Klavier makes a noise of disgust, muffled as it is by his face in his arms. “Give me a moment,” he says, and Apollo does even while plotting their trajectory to the nearest hospital or just back to the office for easy couch access. When he lifts his head again, there’s something artificial and unnatural about the brightness of his eyes, half glamour and half sick. “I wanted to remind myself that something I did since coming back actually mattered. The defendant was an idiot, ja? But he would not have deserved to be falsely convicted, nor die from negligence, as his darling fiance so hoped. That his whole family learned a lesson about this path they had chosen - that I can stress-eat my reminder that something I did was useful—”

“You don’t think anything else you did was?” Apollo interrupts. “Not for Lamiroir and Machi, or—”

“This was the only one that did not cause me more pain,” Klavier replies. “And sometimes it is hard to see the whole forest when the trees around you are falling toward your head. Like I want to tell Kris about the bakery, that there he would have choices there to eat and minimize his salt and still enjoy it as much as I. Or call Daryan and bitch about how I haven’t prosecuted a case in a week and a half and think this the prelude to Herr Chief finally firing me.”

“I really doubt that,” Apollo says. “He has a convicted murderer prosecuting. I think you’re fine.” He’s glad Klavier kept talking, gave him something easy to respond to. What reassurance can he give to the fact that yes, two people Klavier loved - two people he loved most, even - are murderers, and Apollo did the digging to expose that fact. Take comfort that justice is served. How much does it hurt? 

Klavier smiles sadly at him. “That’s kind of you to say, at least.” Clear that he doesn’t believe it, or doesn’t believe that Apollo actually believes it. He pushes some hair away from his eyes. “So you had to face Herr Samurai, ja? How was that?”

“He’s a witch or something worse and I think he tried to kill me,” Apollo says. “He scared the judge into being okay with him having an attack hawk in the courtroom, and even Mr Wright can’t figure out what he is.”

Klavier sighs, his shoulders slumping. “I was afraid I was losing my mind,” he says. “But if it is Herr Samurai, and not me—” They both watch Vongole return with a small twig in her mouth that she drops on Klavier’s shoe. “He reminds me in some way of Kris. The way that when I looked at him I could tell something was odd but - Kris would sometimes be…” His jaw set, he searches for the right word. He tosses aside the twig Vongole left him and she bounds away after it and continues on past it. “Blurry, flickering, with my Sight. Some days I would only get a glimpse of—” He raises a hand and gestures first to the side of his head, around his ear, then to his eyes, and finally pantomiming the curve of Kristoph’s horns that Apollo saw only briefly. Flittering in and out. 

“Do you know why that happened?”

Klavier shakes his head. “And he wasn’t always like that, not at first. And I stopped checking, because I know what my brother looks like, shouldn’t I? And then he just—” He waves a hand in front of his face again. “Kris and his obsession with appearances. Perhaps it ate him from the inside out.”

“So Blackquill…?”

“Ach, I suppose the comparison is small to draw, beyond them both being lawyers and murderers.” He laughs once, sharp and bitter. It’s somehow both something and nothing like the laugh that filled the courtroom half a year ago. “Herr Samurai, I can’t even get a hint of what he might be, and he blurs everything around him too. The Twisted Samurai, ja, is fitting, twisting everything he gets near. It seems to make sense until I ask myself how and why.” 

“I feel like that’s what happens every time someone tells me anything new about magic.” Klavier laughs. “But that’s not part of the standard fae powers, messing with the Sight and people’s eyes?” Apollo asks. Even Kristoph’s tics were visible and highlighted.

“There would be little point to the Sight for us mere humans if they could so easily circumvent it.” Klavier lays his head back on his arms, but turned so that he still can look at Apollo. “Though that would be better. They would have less use for stolen children that way. Our Sight is different than theirs, did you know?” Before Apollo shakes his head, Klavier speaks again. “That for humans it is at will, a choice, to turn on and off, of course, while they are always to see the true forms of other glamoured fae, to see the chains on a witch and the wings of a shapeshifter. What they don’t see so readily are the blessings and curses they pile upon each other’s heads; for that, they look through a magatama like any unSighted human must.”

Vongole flops down on Klavier’s feet and lays her head on Apollo’s shin. He tentatively reaches out and scratches her head. She is more solid than she looks. “Ach, I think the royalty might be able to see everything,” Klavier continues, not looking at Apollo anymore, head raised and eyes fixed somewhere distant. “But they are - the fae are monsters who steal children, the nightmare under the bed, and their royalty are what scare them.” 

(“She could have been queen,” Phoenix said of Mia. Royalty.)

In six months, Apollo has gained no more insight into what is a fitting response to any of this. Or even an awkward, clumsy response. Apollo helps by solving problems, getting acquittals, fixing things. His strategy for sympathy hasn’t changed since he was nine years old, and that strategy is screaming, and Klavier already makes enough jokes about his voice already, thanks. He wants to say something just for the sake of letting Klavier know that he is still mentally present in this park and listening. (He is also mentally back in the office, remembering times that Mia had thrown a blanket at him. The terrifying queen of the faeries, everyone.)

“So those human children who are not artists - the entertainers - they are spies, weapons of politics, to check the curses and blessings on your enemy, tell you everything you can exploit, and maybe in return you try to keep that valuable tool of yours from being destroyed in the crossfire.” Klavier’s voice is soft and even-toned, as though everything he says isn’t so viscerally horrifying that Apollo feels nauseous. 

“And the rest, like me, nameless, underfoot, attached to no alliance, no - keeper, I suppose you could say - I learn only by guessing what blessings and curses look like. Sometimes I see someone and still don’t know. And I learn to keep my mouth shut, because I am no one’s favorite toy, I am no useful piece in anyone’s ambitions in that Court, and they all hold their cards close, divulge no hidden vulnerabilities or secret assets, and should anyone else do so—” 

He snaps his fingers. 

“Oh,” Apollo says.

Even before this he never wanted to wonder what might have happened to a little human girl who could grow up to look just like Vera. He hopes they just left her alone to paint. 

Klavier doesn’t look back at Apollo for any more of a reaction. “I remember so very little of the Court,” he adds, like an afterthought, too breezily for his prior words. “I suppose they took it from me when I left, to keep their secrets - but this I remember. And I - do you know how jealous I was of Kris?” 

Something congeals in his voice, something that sounds to Apollo like the intersection of grief and anger. “That he got to grow up human? That more than that, that our parents were loving ones who cared for him, that he had a name and a voice from the start? That I named a band after myself trying to make myself someone! And still that is not just my name, it is ours, because everything I could have been, he had! From the start!” He presses his hands to the sides of his head. Both are shaking as he raises them. “And he threw it all away!”

Apollo wishes he had words to say, anything to help, that they were in court in a trial and he had evidence and a jury that would put an end to this, usher Klavier back out of the darkness and the skeletons from the closet. There’s no one to save them this time, nothing but the two of them, Klavier trembling, Apollo silent, a silence he could break if he wants to put his foot in his mouth soon after. Because of course that’s what will happen, and maybe if he’s lucky his fumbling would at least make Klavier laugh for a moment. 

“He murdered two men, tried so many more, ruined lives, and I am angry at him that his own life was one of those ruined,” Klavier says. “He deserves it, surely, and it is his victims I should concern myself entirely with, but I…”

“I’m not judging you for that,” Apollo says. 

“And what are you judging me for?”

“Your fashion sense, mostly.”

Klavier laughs, sudden but not sharp, more surprised than anything, his head snapping toward Apollo. “For the first thing, Herr Forehead, there is nothing wrong with my fashion sense.”

“Do you even know how to tie a tie?” 

Klavier doesn’t answer, which Apollo finds suspicious, but he laughs again and elbows Apollo in the arm. “Rude,” he says. 

“Hit a sore spot, clearly,” Apollo says. 

“Hardly. I am unshameable. I’ve never been embarrassed in my life.”

“That does sound like you.”

Klavier tilts his head. “Now why do you make that sound like a bad thing?” His smirk stops it from being a genuine question. 

“Look at your car,” Apollo says. “Look at those deliberate design choices you made.”

“I see we have a rather different perception of what we could consider my flaws.” The smile falls off his lips, makes Apollo realize again how sad his eyes are.

Which reminds Apollo how they started down this road and that something much heavier precipitated it. “Well,” he says. “It’s not exactly like, um, there’s a guide you’re given to follow when someone close to you turns out to be a murderer. I don’t think anyone can tell you how you’re supposed to respond. Especially since this is your brother. And everything else with - with everything.”

Klavier hums, examining his hands. Vongole noses her way into his vision and he starts to push her away before changing course and patting her nose. “My brother,” he repeats. “After all that I admired and trusted him, after all that he had - I would not want someone to be able to tell me how I am supposed to feel. There is no one I would wish this on.” Vongole licks his hand. “Do you mind me asking,” he adds, softly, and Apollo braces himself for anything. “Did you ever have any foster siblings or others your age in the homes you grew up in?”

To gauge whether Apollo can even begin to imagine. To guess on whether he has the chance, however slight, to feel that pain more personally than a mentor he respected. And the answer - how is Apollo supposed to answer that? “None I ever kept in touch with once I left,” he says. 

It’s true in the way the fae speak to truth, if it isn’t true to what Apollo knows in his heart. What he knows he should say, what he wants and doesn’t want to say, is “Yes, I have a brother. His name is Nahyuta. He’s a year older than me and I grew up with him for the first eight years of my life, the longest I ever stayed with one family. We lived in the country of Khura’in, a kingdom so small that if I ever look for news about it, I have to remember how to read Khura’inese, because I never find its modern going-ons reported on in English. And I would have stayed in contact with him if I could.” 

(Because that’s why Apollo first started keeping a journal, isn’t it, when he came to America: to have all of his new adventures easy at hand to recall and share with Nahyuta again when he went home. It helped him practice his written English, too, which started out a hundred times choppier than the spoken. And he kept recording everything, long after hope died, thinking as a lawyer to have records of everything and have his own memory of a case and not just a transcript. It was for him, then, not for his brother, even though if he ever said the full truth, those words would be, “I have a brother; have, present tense, if he hasn’t been killed. I have a brother, present tense, even if I’ve now lived nearly two-thirds of my life away from him and I’m not quite sure if he’s human.”)

And for once Klavier is the one with no way to respond. They both know why he asked; no need to clarify. How many ways to bleed do they share? Not that one, or maybe still, and that’s Apollo’s secret - if Nahyuta were to—

If Nahyuta—

No. 

(Dhurke wanted to overthrow a corrupt queen without shedding blood, but it’s been fifteen years, and when Apollo checked last year, the first time looking up anything about Khura’in in seven years, the queen was still the queen. Maybe they’ll get tired. Does the proper end ever justify the route to get there? Phoenix wants to reform the courts, expose murderers and forged evidence, and he himself faked decisive evidence. What is just in pursuit of justice? Blood on a playing card - blood on rebel hands.)

If Nahyuta. 

End thought.

Apollo leans his head back against the tree. 

“Daryan has a little sister,” Klavier says, his head ducked again and his hands over his eyes.  “Nineteen, maybe, now? She plays the cello, has since she herself was smaller than the instrument. Rock and classical, we all thought it was funny. She was going to university for teaching music. Dropped out, I think, after Daryan’s conviction. I think, only, because I did not hear it from her.” He sighs, his hand now propping his head upright, his eyes closed. “We spoke only after his arrest, when she told me that this was my fault, because had I not gone to Borginia, met Lamiroir and Herr Tobaye, put them in contact with my band - had I not done so, Daryan would not have been tied up in smuggling, would not have committed murder, and she would not have lost her brother.”

“Way to shift the onus of the blame,” Apollo says. He understands the impulse, he’s sure Athena would probably have something to say about it, but of all the people to blame - Klavier, who was losing a friend, too?

“I did tell her such, that Daryan is a grown man who could have chosen not to be involved, and that I empathized with such a loss, with my own brother.” Klavier sighs again, louder this time. “And then she threw a violin at me and told me to fuck off and that was the last I saw of her.”

“An entire violin?” Apollo asks, which is so far from the main point but remains remarkable in the wrong way. 

“She had been refurbishing it,” Klavier says. “I did not stick around to see how much extra refurbishing it would need after that.” He looks pained, what little of his face he’s allowing Apollo to see. “Though strictly speaking she isn’t wrong. Had I not been to Borginia—”

And he pulls up his other arm half around his head, his fingers curling into his hair at the back of his head. Vongole lays her head down on her paws. “Seriously, are you okay?” Apollo asks, pushing himself up onto his knees, his hands hovering over Klavier’s shoulder and back, because despite everything, there still feels like a gulf between them that hasn’t been crossed, all of the times Klavier has poked his forehead aside. “And this time don’t just avoid the—”

Klavier groans. “Herr Forehead, you are yelling in my ear.” Apollo sits back on his heels. That can’t actually help, can it? “You shouldn’t be worrying about me.”

“That’s not ‘yeah, I’m okay’,” Apollo says. “That’s avoiding the question.”

Klavier shakes his head, the movement limited by the position of his arms, and he makes a disgusted noise from the back of his throat. “It’s nothing you can help with.”

“That just sounds like you’re dying!” 

“We could hardly be so lucky,” Klavier says dryly. He shifts, his hand still clutching his hair, his cheek resting on his other arm, to look at Apollo from one eye. “Do you ever wonder what your life would have been like if some certain or another thing had not happened?”

“Huh?” And what the hell does that have to do with this, them, now?

Which is a question Klavier expects. “It will make sense in a moment, ja? I promise.”

Somewhere there’s got to be a connecting thread, but it’s like they’re in court, Klavier two steps ahead and setting out the pieces for Apollo to catch up. “I didn’t used to,” Apollo says slowly, because even though he doesn’t understand the groundwork being laid, it matters to Klavier, and he might as well answer honestly. “But now I find myself thinking about it a lot more.”

Sadness, not anger, knits Klavier’s eyebrows close together. He must suspect Apollo to be saying, in a veiled sort of way, “I keep wondering what would have happened if my boss your brother didn’t turn out to be a corrupt murdering fae.”

And that’s not it. That’s not the quandary on Apollo’s mind. But he’s got no way to say, “This isn’t about your brother; it’s about mine.”

(If Dhurke hadn’t sent him away. If Apollo grew up knowing what he and Nahyuta were. If Apollo’s father didn’t die, or Apollo wasn’t stolen away - if he remembered who told him the story of how he came to be raised by Dhurke, because the fae can’t lie but was it Dhurke or Datz who talked about a fire killing Apollo’s father?)

“So what does that have to do with anything?” Apollo prompts. Klavier isn’t going to keep going on his own; he looks like he’s half somewhere else, dazed and glassy-eyed. 

“I don’t have to wonder,” Klavier says. “I know where I would be had Kris and I never been switched. I, ah, see it sometimes. Like I imagine seeing the future would be, except.” He frowns. His frowns are always very pronounced, more like a pout, that on other days Apollo has been tempted to laugh at. (Or that’s the thought that Apollo most allows himself to entertain regarding Klavier’s lips, anyway.) “Except nothing like the future; I don’t know why I’m saying that. It’s quite more like looking sideways, I suppose.”

This time he waits, watching Apollo keenly for a reaction. He’s not going to get one, given that Apollo is still figuring whether this means sort of what he thinks it might, and he’s only part of the way through it. “Like visions?” he asks.

Klavier nods. He starts to unfold himself, stretching his legs out and uncurling his arms from around his head to cross them across his chest, still defensive. “Visions, ja. Of where I would be, what I am doing, having gotten to grow up human. And an only child, as well.” He picks up from the ground the journal he was writing in when Apollo first approached. “I take notes, when it happens - a diary of the life I’ve never had.” He flips through it quickly, too quickly for Apollo to read any of the words, and rather he watches pages and pages of different colorful inks flap past. 

“How long has this been happening?” Apollo asks. 

“On and off through Themis and my first year as a prosecutor.” Klavier snaps the journal shut again. “Almost never for all those years traveling and touring with the band. And then I came back and it’s worse than ever. If there’s a pattern I’d love to know it.” He glances around, finds the pink pen he had earlier, and begins tapping it against his leg. “I let my mind relax for a moment and there’s always a new piece working its way in. I can usually push it back out with something else to focus on, except now today it feels like someone taking a jackhammer to my skull from the inside out. An injury to insult for this particular occasion. I can’t even enjoy the quiet day at the office my other self would have had today.” 

The pen flings loose when he abruptly stops moving his hand and Vongole, with a heavy exhale, rises up off the ground to retrieve it. Klavier’s mouth twists. 

“Are you still a prosecutor?” Apollo asks. “Or, how do you phrase that? Is it hypothetical? Would you have been?” If he’d stayed with Dhurke, he still would have wanted to be a defense attorney. But if not for Dhurke, if Apollo had grown up with his birth family, whoever they were, would he still? What could he have been instead? Was Kristoph the catalyst for Klavier? Who would he have been without his brother? (Who would Apollo have been without his?)

“It’s the least hypothetical hypothetical scenario,” Klavier says. “Which is to say it absolutely does not matter in the slightest.” He grins and it takes several seconds to fade. “But yes, I am. Still. Would be?” Apollo snorts. Klavier glares at him. “Verdammt, now you have me confused. - I wasn’t a prosecutor at seventeen, though. Didn’t go to Themis, wasn’t trying to catch up to Kris as soon as I could. I was Kris, after all. Or not him, but that should have been my name, except I went by would-have-gone-by Kris, and he never tolerated anyone but me calling him that.” Klavier squeezes his eyes shut and brings a hand up to rub his temple. “Does any of this make sense?”

“Relatively,” Apollo says. “The whole concept doesn’t make sense in the first place, but within the overall ‘what the fuck’” - Klavier laughs - “I’m mostly following it.”

“There is a reason I did not tell you about this with everything else, back when.” Klavier waves his hand, unsuccessfully feigning casual dismissiveness. “It’s a bit of a stretch even from ‘my older brother is my changeling doppelganger’, ja?” Another attempt at being casual, glancing at Apollo from just the corners of his eyes, but the worried downturn of his brow and mouth continue to betray him. “And the disconcerting philosophical questions, if this implies that some things are destined to happen - that it all always would have turned out as I see if I had not been taken, that there are choices we are bound to make.” He shrugs. “Or perhaps this is not magic at all and is just my mind trying to make sense of all that happened in the worst way possible. I should ask Herr Samurai for his opinion. You know he studied psychology, ja?” 

“Please do not try and use your coworker the convicted murderer as a therapist,” Apollo says. “Based on all the stunts he pulled in court, all his manipulating and twisting people - he would take all that information you gave to him and use it to destroy you.”

“I would be asking his opinion on one matter, not offering him my entire life story.”

“You entire life story is kinda tied into this one matter!”

“Besides,” Klavier says, at the same time Apollo is objecting, “he and I are both prosecutors. What reason would he have to want to destroy me? It is not as though he could use it to his advantage as my opponent in court.”

Who knows why a murderer like him might do anything, Apollo thinks, about to say it, and then Klavier’s actual words, “my opponent in court”, fully register. He squints at him. “Are you saying I would use it against you?” After everything they have been through - after everything Apollo has helped him with?

“I’m saying that I would have less concern consulting with him than some others,” Klavier says darkly. Apollo isn’t sure what he’s implying with this but doesn’t really like the options. “And while I do not doubt your experience in court, when I spoke with Herr Samurai he was not unpleasant. He quite liked to talk about his bird, and his bird quite enjoyed terrorizing Vongole.”

“That bird would fight god if given the chance,” Apollo says. “And I’m not sure I would want to spend time with a murderer anyway.”

“I seem to end up at that point anyway,” Klavier says bitterly, “and at least on this occasion I am forewarned.”

Apollo swallows the lump in his throat. There’s no good response to that. Klavier’s eyes meet his again, and he lets the silence drag on several more seconds before very softly he says, “But I do like to think I know magic, and I do think that this is more than solely my mind. A last mocking joke from the Winter Court, ja? I won my way home and they taunt me with the knowledge that I am not truly free by dangling ahead of me the life they stole from me.”

“Wouldn’t it really be Kristoph who stole it from you?” Apollo asks. Klavier’s eyes narrow. “That the Court took you, and your brother took your life?”

His expression relaxes. “I was jealous, like I said, but never angry, not at him. He did not ask for it any more than I. We were - I presumed we were in agreement that it was they who were to blame, not each other.” But not sure. Not now, not after everything. Who could blame him? “And I am angry that he squandered the life he had, but not that he had it.”

Apollo watches for lies and waits. And waits, and waits. And accepts that even if Klavier did mean that he’s not sure if Apollo won’t use any of this against him, he’s still continuing to be honest with him. “It would have been a much easier life,” Klavier says. “From everything I…” He motions to his journal. “Many less lows, this past year. Though also some other less.” He tilts his head toward Apollo and shrugs one shoulder. A question, shall I go on? Apollo nods.

Klavier begins ticking off points on his fingers. “I am a prosecutor still, but never the rock star. I did not meet Daryan - I am eight years older than him, so how were we to? No Gavinneers, no tours, no songs on the radio. Music just does stay a hobby.” With a wry grin that falls immediately into an unhappy one, he adds, “Though I never gave up the piano. It’s - how am I to weigh it? I never have a second career I so loved - I am not at Themis to meet my favorite professor - I never know Daryan, but that means, I imagine, that he does not get caught up in smuggling. Maybe he finds trouble on his own, or maybe his sister gets to keep her brother.”

“You don’t know for sure?” 

“It’s like looking through a one-way mirror. I know what is changed with this me-I-could-have-been, but he - I - cannot know what’s happened here.” He spreads his hands wide, palms up, gesturing to the world. “I can’t change what I know there. I can’t get a message to myself to say, go look up Daryan Crescend, see how he is doing. I never met him. There’s no reason for me to pay attention to that name.” He shakes his head. “I know Phoenix Wright only because we have faced each other in court every so often over the past eight years.”

The number stings. It would have a bite on its own, but Klavier gives its teeth extra force, extra sharpness. Without Kristoph, no diary page, no disbarment. Phoenix Wright remains a defense attorney. “Does he still adopt Trucy?” Apollo asks. With no diary page, is Zak Gramarye acquitted, or does he vanish anyway? What happens to Trucy if she stays a Gramarye? The concept isn’t one Apollo likes. 

Klavier shrugs. “I don’t know,” he says. “He and I only cross paths in court, and he still does not exactly like me, at all.”

“I’ve told you I’m pretty sure he has nothing against you,” Apollo says. He frowns. “And what happened that he doesn’t like you in—” What to call it? A parallel universe, another lifetime?                                             

“It is - hm.” Klavier eyes him suspiciously. “Something that happened, yes.”

“That bad?” Apollo asks. Klavier fiddles with his hair. Apollo takes a shot from a different angle. “Or that embarrassing?”

Klavier elbows him in the side. “That’s quite enough from you, Herr Forehead.”

“Didn’t you say you don’t get embarrassed?”

“I am not embarrassed. I am ashamed on behalf of - of—”

“Of yourself,” Apollo finishes. 

“Yes.”

Apollo raises his eyebrows. Klavier stares back, an attempt at a glare that slowly cracks apart into laughter. “That sounds ridiculous,” Apollo says. “You sound ridiculous.”

“I’m aware,” Klavier says. “That happens. I actually only have a suspicion about what happened between myself and your boss in—” He waves his hand vaguely. “Which reminds me that I have meant to ask you, for several reasons, do you have any idea what on earth it is between your boss and mine?”

“What?” Apollo asks. Even if Klavier is leaping from topic to topic this quickly to keep his mind and visions at bay, he’s abandoned the linear path between anything.

“This is not to say that there is an office pool on if-when they are dating, but I am not to say that there is not such a thing, either,” Klavier says.

“You’re betting on your boss’s love life?” Apollo asks, aghast. Did he ever harbor a delusion that the Prosecutors Office is more functional than the Wright Anything Agency? He definitely hasn’t since spending New Years with Faraday and Debeste. Which, now that he thinks about it: “Wait, that wasn’t a thing that Detective Faraday started or something?”

“I am not part of it,” Klavier says. “I don’t gamble anymore unless I know I will win. But yes, it was her, up to nothing good, as ever.”

“I don’t know anything,” Apollo says. “I mean, I know Mr Wright is friends with him, but not like - well, today Mr Wright left and said he was going to study for the Bar somewhere else, and Trucy just guessed that he was going to see Edgeworth and he didn’t say he wasn’t.”

“If you can get any information out of the Fräulein I will split the winnings with you,” Klavier says. “And I will tell you the ill-advised decisions my other self has made if you promise to keep your mouth shut.”

Apollo blinks. “Yeah?” he says, not meaning to sound hesitant, but doesn’t Klavier know that he hasn’t talked about anything he told him last October? Why would that change now? (Though maybe if it is actually embarrassing, Apollo won’t pass up the opportunity to mock him about it directly to his face.) “Of course.”

“I am reasonably sure that - you know, hypothetically, looking sideways, all of that - that in that hypothetical lifetime, I seem to have unwisely walked myself right into some romantic entanglement of theirs and earned Herr Turnabout’s ire, I believe perhaps out of jealousy, that I asked out Herr Chief.”

Klavier twists some strands of his bangs around his fingers, lips pursed tightly together, waiting for Apollo’s reaction. It arrives delayed and more confused than Apollo has been in a while, though he keeps thinking he’s hit peak confusion and keeps being surprised. “So you’re a homewrecker?” Apollo asks dumbly.

“Nein, I am not!” Klavier smacks Apollo on the shoulder with his journal. “They were not dating! I would not have - I assume it was anger that before he would get himself together, someone else would—”

“You asked your boss on a date?” Apollo asks, louder than the last question, loud enough that even in the half-barren park it might carry. Klavier slaps his hand over Apollo’s mouth with too flat a palm and enough force that it’s a bit like a slap in the teeth.

“He was not Chief Prosecutor, and so not my boss at that moment,” Klavier says, half defensive and half apologetic, pulling his hand back away. Apollo runs his tongue over his teeth; they’ve stopped stinging now. “And furthermore, I am about their age, ja? Or I would have been - my brother is a year younger than them.” Klavier tilts his head to the side, and a slow, lopsided grin spreads across it, wicked and mocking both. “And Herr Chief is a very handsome man, you must admit.”

Apollo covers his face with his hands. “I don’t have to say anything,” he says.

“You were curious, as I recall. You asked.”

“Right,” Apollo says. “I’m good now thanks. Don’t need any more.”

“There’s not much more to tell,” Klavier says, propping up his chin on his hand. “It went nowhere and was not an avenue I chose to dwell on.” With his other hand he picks at the corner of his journal. “I shouldn’t dwell on any of it I’m sure, but there’s some part of it that’s fascinating. Such a quieter life with so many less griefs and my coworkers don’t resent me. I have a dog, a golden retriever. And other parks to take her to, nowhere near kitsune mafia fronts and defense attorneys who know too much about me.”

That’s certainly a statement to unpack. Klavier, as ever, doesn’t linger on it. “Muffin?” he asks, picking up a paper bag from his other side and offering it to Apollo. “I overestimated how much I wanted to stress eat while I was at the bakery.”

“I didn’t know rock stars are allowed to stress eat,” Apollo says, taking the bag and glancing inside. “Are these the regular ones or the, uh, fae ones. Trucy and I get them for Vera whenever she comes to hang out, but I don’t like them as much.”

“I refuse to forsake salt, ever,” Klavier says. “Those are regular. How is Fräulein Changeling doing, anyway?”

As always tends to happen, he asks the question of Apollo once Apollo has a mouthful of muffin. “She’s pretty good,” he says finally, after a perilous second where he thought he might choke to death. “She’s got an apprenticeship, kind of, I guess, with a friend of Mr Wright’s who’s a children’s book author-illustrator. Since November or December, I forget. She’s been talking lately about wanting to sell her house to leave all the bad associations in the past.” Phoenix promised her he would help her with that, even though he isn’t that kind of lawyer. Or any lawyer, right now. 

“Ach, I understand that feeling quite well,” Klavier says. Apollo takes another bite of muffin. Klavier watches Vongole chew on a rock again. “This ‘friend’,” he adds. “Do they know what she is?”

“Oh, yeah. He knows a lot about all of that. Mr Wright said he accidentally became a witch once.”

“He accidentally…?” Klavier is rarely struck speechless. His mouth opens and closest several times. “Of course that is possible, but…” He clicks his tongue several times. “That is not a thing that someone just easily comes away from. Your boss knows the strangest people.”

“No kidding.” And it wouldn’t be any less weird if Kristoph had never been, would he? Trucy might not be around, but Larry - Mia - Iris - they come from before. The biggest difference in the office besides Trucy would be - would be. “Do you know if I still work for Mr Wright?”

He wouldn’t need a badge. He wouldn’t need a bloody ace. Apollo never would have never worked for Gavin Law Office. He surely would have admired Phoenix just as much, maybe even more if he had seven extra years of stellar and befuddling cases, and working at Wright and Co. would be an option - provided Phoenix would let him. And would Phoenix, not needing someone with a badge to make his plans work, even bother? 

Klavier shakes his head. “I don’t know.” He opens his journal and pages through until he reaches a dog-eared corner. “I marked some of the cases against him and once I wrote it down blocked it all out. He had a young woman with him in court that time, rather pretty, black hair, dressed something like—” He shrugs. “A monk, I wrote. Whatever that is supposed to mean now.”

That sounds familiar. 

“But it is like what I said about Daryan, ja? That I am looking sideways through a mirror, and he, this other me, he does not know anything I care about. He doesn’t know what he’s passed by, what he’s lost, what he’s missed. I’m afraid all I know is that we never met.”

And if they did, would they care? They would have no Kristoph in common, no shared trauma of betrayal, with ten extra years between them. 

Maybe it’s a different life for Apollo, too. Maybe in the lifetime where Klavier is never taken away and grows up entirely without his brother, Apollo is never sent away and grows up with his. 

“Oh,” is all he can think to say, and then to save himself from looking like he should have something to say, he finishes eating the muffin. They watch two joggers and their dog loop past on the path. The wind rustles some leaves loose from the tree and Apollo tries and fails to catch one as it flutters past his face. The time to breathe is welcome; there has been so little of it in the course of the conversation. Time to grapple with all of it or maybe none, focus on this that they have now. They can’t escape one way through the mirror.

When he glances back at Klavier he feels immediately guilty for the chance to relax. Klavier has folded back into himself, knees to his chest, head resting on his arms, his journal carelessly abandoned, still open, on the ground. “Are you sure there’s nothing that helps?” Apollo asks. Give him a way to fix it. It’s the only comfort he knows how to provide. 

“When I was still considering going into work this morning, I ate a whole bag of pretzels and got nearly an hour’s reprieve.” Through his arms, his voice is a mumble. Apollo tries to picture it: Klavier, some sort of mess in the morning, with a party-size bag of pretzels, shoving them into his mouth by the handful. A dignified image for either a celebrity or prosecutor, it is not. “Unreasonable amounts of salt is my attempt, and that has its own very large issues.” He lifts his head, hair falling into his eyes, to offer Apollo a very weak grin. “Rock stars die young all the time, but how many have high sodium as the cause?”

Apollo doesn’t laugh, can’t even bring himself to try. Klavier surely notices but doesn’t seem to care, doesn’t cease the light, ugly chuckle that followed his words. “Speaking of unreasonable amounts of salt,” Apollo says, because now that Klavier has given him one piece of the case, one fractal of evidence, he’s got a shot at solving it, “have you ever tried anything from Eldoon’s noodle stand?”

“His is the stand from that case?” Klavier buries his head back in his arms, and Apollo nods before realizing that doesn’t work and audibly confirming it. “I have not. Why?”

“It’s the saltiest ramen I’ve ever had in my life,” Apollo says. That still can’t actually fully impress upon him the true understanding of Eldoon’s Noodles. “It’s the saltiest anything I’ve ever had in my life. Mr Wright says nobody’s ever managed to eat more than two bowls of it in a day, so when we went yesterday after court, the new kid, Athena, took it as a challenge.” Of course she did. She takes everything as a challenge. She makes competition where it doesn’t need to be. “She made it a bowl and a half and then spent the rest of the day lying on the couch saying she’s probably dying but if she survives this is her first step to building up immunity and beating the record.” Trucy promised to assist Athena in such an endeavor, and Phoenix had looked over her head at Apollo and rolled his eyes. Death by noodle stand, the next step forward from being shot dead while pulling said noodle stand. 

“That sounds quite promising,” Klavier says. “And like a challenge I should like to attempt. Tell me we don’t have to walk far, though.”

“He’s only a block past the office,” Apollo says. “Sometimes you can hear his harmonica from here.”

Vongole lifts her head, pointing her nose to the sky and swiveling her ears about. After a moment she springs to her feet, a single motion that nonetheless looks jerky and wrong, like a frame has skipped in the middle that should have showed her picking herself up from the ground. Klavier hasn’t moved. “Or I can just bike down there myself. Meet in the middle at the office if we want to sit somewhere that isn’t the dirt.”

Klavier mumbles something that he must also realize is incomprehensible, and he raises his head and repeats, “How much am I gonna owe you?”

Apollo stands, dusting grass and dirt off of his knees. “I can’t in good conscience accept payment for something that you don’t fully understand how actually awful it is,” he says, lifting his bike back away from the tree. “Besides, Mr Eldoon gives a little discount to everyone who works with Mr Wright, anyway.”

Which definitely implies something about their collective tastes.

He doesn’t think he’s ever gotten Eldoon’s two days in a row and even telling himself that these are extenuating circumstances, he doesn’t like the precedent it sets. His standards have never been good but they’re not so much slipping now as they are plummeting down an elevator shaft. Mr Eldoon does not remark on it, to which Apollo is grateful. He knows no one in the office would let him live - the real and alarming but also conceptually hilarious question would be whether Trucy would approve or not of a “date” with Klavier to Eldoon’s of all places. 

She really would not let him live if she ever finds out about it.

Apollo orders his usual and tells Eldoon to give him two more of whichever, because Klavier said he didn’t care as long as it was salty, and Apollo is not about to ask Eldoon to give him his saltiest. At that point that would be manslaughter, at best. He’s paying for it when he gets a text from Klavier, slightly less typo-laden than before, saying that he has decided after all to relocate to the office. And a minute later:

-do you not lock your office ever??

Mia, welcoming him in. Should he tell him about Mia? Is that even something he would want to know, the lurking ghost, privy to their every word? But for the moment he shoves his phone into his pocket and walks his bike and the noodles back up to the office.

“Mess as it is, there’s probably something worth stealing in here,” Klavier says when Apollo enters. He looks uneasy, wary, like he’s been pacing the room before Apollo arrived, and he doesn’t sit down until Apollo sets the noodles down on the coffee table and sinks into one couch. Even then, he lowers himself awkwardly, his eyes swirling between shades of blue as he glances about. “I certainly wouldn’t just leave anything unlocked in this part of town.”

Apollo wants to argue that it’s not bad, all considered; Phoenix says the Kitakis keep it orderly, and the only cursed locale for a square mile around is the run-down hotel across the street from the window behind Apollo’s desk. (And Apollo had asked how worried he should be about that, and Phoenix said not at all, because he and Mia both hated that people staying in some of the hotel rooms could just see straight into the office. Which then gave Apollo reason to wonder exactly who cursed it, along with reason to never walk past the building on the same side of the street as it. Typical Los Angeles sort of thing. Who in the city doesn’t have a place like that?)

What he ends up saying is, “I don’t think we ever have to worry about getting robbed,” and that is a statement weird enough that he knows he is going to have to explain and he regrets this. Klavier raises an eyebrow and accepts the two takeout bowls that Apollo has indicated are his. “Since the office is, uh, haunted.” Apollo waits, grimacing. Klavier looks at him, expression still unchanged. “By Mr Wright’s mentor. I have an office key but I’ve never actually needed to lock or unlock, because she does it. And I don’t think she would just allow anyone to come in.”

“I knew it,” Klavier says. 

“What?”

“I suspected as much,” he amends. “That there is something wrong in here, about here. It’s felt a different kind of wrong every time I’ve been.”

Apollo glances up at the lights. They don’t flicker. He might have expected her to take offense at Klavier’s description, wrong, wrong. Klavier talking about the royalty. Apollo won’t mention all he knows about Mia. “She spent the winter throwing a blanket at me whenever I got cold,” he says. “It’s not really that haunted-haunted.”

“And I haven’t been smited yet,” Klavier mutters. “Still, I would not - I would be careful, is all, ja? You never know what may happen, if you were to fall asleep on the couch here and wake up to have your body puppeteered by a fae spirit.”

“Can they do that?” Apollo asks. Klavier shrugs. “Mr Wright says he got amnesia from sleeping on one of the defendant lobby couches but I think he left out a few pieces of that story.”

“Knowing him, that was actually all there was to it.”

Apollo cannot find room to object. Instead, he waits for that smug look to disappear from Klavier’s face with his first bite of noodles. No one adequately braces themselves for it - Trucy laughed at Apollo, Apollo at Clay and Ema, and Apollo and Phoenix at Athena, though they didn’t have long to laugh before they were horrified by the way she, still spluttering from the first mouthful, immediately went in for more without finishing chewing. Prodigy in some regard, worryingly dense in others. 

But Apollo watches and Klavier’s expression doesn’t change; he doesn’t flinch. His eye twitches. Is this a glamour that he’s almost holding together? Apollo turns his attention to his own meal, some ever-growing part of him already filled with regret, and Klavier laughs suddenly, brightly, a welcome change from the bitter amusement that threaded through their conversation. “This is how I used to make ramen at Themis,” he says, his grin wistful but sharpening. “Back when I was first discovering salt.”

“You didn’t have salt before them at home?” There were several years between the faery ring and Themis, several that should be accounted for in here.

“Our parents wanted to avoid it as much as possible for Kris and stopped me from dumping the excess I truly wanted on my plate, and then—” Klaver stops to take another bite and to try and rein in his grin. He doesn’t succeed, and still with his face torn between reminisce and wickedness, he continues, “And then we drove our parents to the point that they didn’t keep any in the house for safety’s sake.”

And still grinning he waits for Apollo to ask him what the hell that means. Which Apollo does, but only after half a minute’s pause where the only sound is the slurping of noodles and broth. “What did you do?” 

“It was Kris’ idea, to start. All very thorough of him, of course, as he is.” There, again, sadness that glamour can’t hide or maybe doesn’t try to. “He needed to know what it was to be a changeling, to be fae - what it meant for him in regards to iron and salt and all the superstitions he heard and scoffed at.”

“He hadn’t ever noticed something that he thought was, like, metal allergies, or food, or something?” Apollo twists the ring on his hand and thinks of Clay’s horseshoe amulet. 

(It’s easy to know, with a friend like Clay: the first time Apollo went over to play at his house, Clay had lightly knocked him in the forehead with first it and then a crucifix, just to be sure, because he’d been up late sneaking movies on TV and had seen some version of Dracula and ended up extra paranoid for a few months. They’re still not actually sure where the crucifix came from, because no one in any part of Clay’s family is Catholic.)

“Or is that something that runs on belief, too?” Apollo asks. “That since he didn’t know he wasn’t human, he had no reason to think that it would harm him, so it didn’t?”

“A self-fulfilling weakness,” Klavier says. “I suppose that is possible, though pure enough iron is not precisely common unless you are seeking it out, and salt’s effects not enough to assume…” He rubs one thumb over the ring on the other. “Kris never mentioned anything he did or didn’t notice before he knew, but after, we had it in mind to conduct experiments. After all, he was fae but raised human, and I was human raised with the fae, and we wondered how each of us might be affected. 

“I gathered up everything that I thought could be iron, not that I in my life had ever known iron. They do not exactly have it and salt on hand in the Twilight Realm. Some pots and frying pans, some scrap metal and nails from the shed, there was at least one ordinary rock in there and Kris took it like ‘you know nothing about this is any kind of metal?’” 

Apollo is still surprised when he changes his voice, drops the accent, to imitate Kristoph, and if Klavier’s surprise in return is an indication, he hadn’t even realized this time that he was doing it. They both look away from each other, concentrate too long on their ramen. “And somehow it all went so much worse than you would expect,” Klavier says quietly. “We didn’t get to the salt step before Kris had a broken toe because I dropped the frying pan, and I had to go to the hospital for a tetanus shot because I had a rusty nail through my foot.”

Taking in Apollo’s horror, Klavier adds quickly, “Oh, that was not something Kris did, no, no. I had been poking him with the non-pointy ends of each of the collection of nails I had scrounged up, I dropped a few, I did not find them all, and I did not believe in shoes at the time because I saw no reason for them, and you know how that ends, ja. So our poor suffering parents confiscated all the salt before we found a way to hurt each other with that, too.”

Apollo lets out his breath. He hadn’t wanted to even consider that prospect, but since his method of reassuring himself was thinking that Kristoph, the man whose plans to kill were to lay poison and curses, wouldn’t ever stoop to physical violence unless he was completely out of options - well, at that point, there wasn’t any keeping that thought off his face. “Your poor parents,” he agrees.

(For just a moment he thinks that he and Nahyuta weren’t able to drive Dhurke to something like that, because of how hands-off and otherwise busy he was, but he still had to dive in a river to save them from drowning. And then there was Datz, who provided the opposite of help whenever he was around, forcing Dhurke to, on one occasion Apollo can dredge back up from the pits of attempted forceful repression, retrieve a knife from Nahyuta. Nahyuta had cried when Dhruke took it away, because of course he had, and then Apollo cried because on the worst days they were a stupid feedback loop of emotionality and not knowing what was and wasn’t worth getting hung up on.)

“They did their best and we did not make it easy.” That they are eating while talking means the silences in between feel more natural, but that in itself gives Apollo less warning that Klavier is about to drop something heavy on his head again. “I’m grateful, in some way, that they never had to see how it turned out. All their work to stop us beating the hell out of each other.” He grimaces. “Did I tell you that the scar on Kris’ hand was one I gave to him?”

“You did.” The last time they were here together in this office. 

“It was after our parents died,” Klavier says, watching the noodles slide from his chopsticks with no apparent concern and stabs them back into the bowl. “Kris was twenty-four, I believe - he’d moved into an apartment here by then, and I was dorming at Themis. I had just bought one of these” - he spreads his fingers out, examining the rings he wears - “or maybe that one” - he points at Apollo’s hand - “who knows, and we were arguing about something stupid. It could have been about the ring, why I so felt the need to keep iron literally on hand when he was… I suppose he felt slighted, or like I did not trust him. He put a finger in my face and I smacked his hand away and the iron left a burn that turned into a scar.” Klavier picks up his chopsticks. “And we never talked about it again, because why would we?”

“I can understand that impulse,” Apollo says. “Why bother having the awkward conversations if you can just repress everything?”

From personal experience. Why try explaining his childhood when he can just never bring it up? What’s it matter anymore?  

Klavier snorts. “You know, Herr Forehead, I’m not sure I like how easily you’ve summarized my methods.”

And Apollo likes that they’re focused enough on Klavier for him not to guess that Apollo is speaking for himself, too. “Except I’ve figured you out because of all these awkward conversations we keep having.”

“My tried-and-true coping mechanism failed me at the worst time,” Klavier says through a mouthful of ramen. Hilarious, really, to look at this man and remember what a dazzling celebrity he can pretend to be. “But salt has not yet let me down.”

“Did you really make ramen like this?” Apollo sets his down. Halfway through and he doesn’t think he’s going to get any further. The memory of yesterday’s salt still lingers. This is not a sustainable diet. 

“I made everything like this,” Klavier says, grinning. “If I can think of a food I did not put salt on, I will tell you.”

“No, I don’t think I want to know, because that exception is going to prove the rule, and the rule is that you are terrible.”

“Nein, you are not running from this. This is the least distressing can of worms we have opened all evening and we are going to lie in it.”

“That’s not the saying,” Apollo says. “Do you mean, like, you put salt on - on—” What’s the worst thing he can think of? “Like, cookies?”

“That’s amateur hour, really now. I poured salt in my coffee.” 

“No!” He isn’t lying, and Apollo is gagging already on the mere thought of salted coffee. “What is wrong with you?”

“You know how those little sugar packets” - he holds up his forefingers about an inch and a half apart - “that are sitting around for coffee? And there are little salt packets, similar size, abouts, often near them? Why shouldn’t they be used for the same thing?”

“No,” Apollo repeats. “No, you can’t do this to me.”

With the biggest shit-eating Apollo has seen, Klavier continues, “Our parents had never allowed me to drink coffee! How was I to know what to do with it? I did what seemed reasonable!”

“And you didn’t think, I don’t know, ‘this tastes horrible’!”

“It was dining hall coffee at a pretentious boarding high school! It was always going to taste horrible!” Klavier seems more alive than he has all day, and Apollo finally feels like he’s more than simply a pair of ears, even if another pair of ears is what Klavier needs. They are lawyers through and through, and a good argument does wonders. Or a bad argument, an inconsequential argument, something with as much messy laughter as yelling, for the sake of nothing but not wanting to relent. “I poured extra salt on bags of pretzels! It was about the salt, and I was perfectly pleased with any kind of salt-delivery vessel. Applesauce, yogurt - extra flavoring to cereal and milk.”

Apollo pantomimes vomiting on the floor. Klavier presses his lips together and thoughtfully ponders the coffee table. “I wonder if I still have any of the salt shakers I stole out of the dining hall,” he says.

This time, Apollo’s choking is not feigned, and he spends several very long seconds coughing and praying that he doesn’t die this way, which would be even stupider than dying from eating too much of Eldoon’s ramen. “So you could - could—” He wheezes in between his words. This is definitely the stupid way he dies. “—Could have a steady supply of sodium straight into your veins at all times?”

“See, you understand,” Klavier says. Apollo coughs again, both a decent way of expressing his disbelief and necessary because he’s still choking on a bit of air. “For everything I kept stashed in my room. Candy bars, pudding cups—”

“I am begging you to stop,” Apollo says. “I am actually begging you. I will grovel if it means I never have to hear you utter something like ‘salt in milk’ ever again.”

He lost this round of pointless arguments, and he knows it, and Klavier, smirking, knows it, and that smirk still leaves Apollo with the impulse to smack it off his face. Insufferable, insufferably pretty, and they both know it. “How else were you to properly empathize with my suffering?” Klavier asks, his tone light enough to make it a joke.

“I think I am suffering in a very different way than you, now.” 

“Perhaps.” Klavier props his chin on his hand, his first bowl of noodles finished, and he either pausing before or reconsidering the wisdom of the second bowl. “There was an actual reason I ate like that, and not just not knowing what to do with salt and relishing the chance,” he adds. “One of the professors at Themis - she was not the head of my course, she had been a judge not a prosecutor, but I took several classes from her anyway because I liked her - told me that it is a very common thing, for humans returned from the fae realm, to have horrific salt cravings. The kind that compels you to try putting it in orange juice.”

“Please.” Apollo puts his face in his hands. “Please.” The actual meaning of Klavier’s words, the implication, sinks in a moment later. “Have enough people even come back from the Twilight Realm for anyone to be able to say something’s common? And how would she even know that?”

Klavier shrugs. “I never asked her. I was too afraid to.” He shakes his head. “These were the secrets that my family barely spoke of even behind closed doors, that my brother and I buried, and here she was speaking so openly of such things because she noticed that I kept pouring salt on every meal. And I think she was human, and that she was talking about it should be an invitation that I am - ‘allowed’, I suppose” - he makes quote marks in the air with his fingers - “to ask her, ja?” He lowers his hands very slowly. “But information like that is a weapon in the Court whether you mean it to be or not, and I was afraid to know anything that would make me armed. So even though she became something like a mentor to me we only ever spoke of academics and the legal system and my music and her art projects. Things of consequence here, not there.”

“She’s an artist?” Apollo asks. What was it, exactly, that Phoenix said about artist types and changelings, the moment before he and Apollo both realized?

“She is. Almost any kind of visual arts she could - sculpting, pottery, painting, papercraft, certainly more I am forgetting.” His mouth twists in a scowl. “I suspected that could mean she is like me, but she did not look like what I now am sure that being stolen away looks like.”

“You did say once that you’d met someone who was like you.” And only one; how rare to escape. No surprise that he was afraid of what his professor could be if she knew. “Who was that?”

Klavier freezes, about to take up the second bowl of ramen. He looks like a witness under pressure on the witness stand, Vera struggling to put a name to the man who forged the diary page, Jinxie terrified of the swath of yokai before her. “Oh,” Apollo says. Asking that question immediately after Klavier had just explained to him why he won’t talk about it. “Right. You don’t talk about those things.”

Klavier loudly slurps his noodles and shakes his head. “Some part of me got left behind when I bargained for my freedom and is still sure someone will kill me for speaking to anything.”

Not a lie; visibly not a lie to anyone who could see the fear lingering in Klavier’s wild-eyed expression. Apollo files that away, not to ask, not unless it’s of dire importance, not to put Klavier on the spot like that when it still eats away at him. (Apollo has a magatama he can borrow; Apollo has Phoenix around sometimes. Phoenix is secretive because he’s an asshole, not because he’s neurotic from trauma. He’s the person to wrangle the truth from.)

But a lump sits heavy in Apollo’s throat, and he can’t swallow it, finds it grows bigger as he tries. Klavier went so long without mentioning the blessing on Apollo; Phoenix goes without mentioning anything. “That other person - that isn’t me, is it?”

He’s shocked he manages to get the words out at all. 

Klavier jerks back and then he sits forward, squinting suspiciously at Apollo. “What? No. You’re not.” Apollo scans him, waiting to see red, waiting for the worst to be confirmed after all, but there’s nothing, nothing that he sees, and he knows Klavier and he knows Klavier isn’t like Blackquill and he hopes there’s no one ese in the damn world who’s like Blackquill. He likes to be able to trust his own eyes. “Why would you even suspect…?”

His bright blue eyes linger on Apollo’s face, where last year he first pointed out the dragon scales marked on Apollo that he’ll never be able to see himself. And he’s answering his own question, silently, and showing Apollo that answer. If the blessing came from someone who stole him; but a child in the Court would never need Truth as a blessing, because they are among fae who can’t lie. And Apollo didn’t even grow up around here, anyway. 

“I dunno,” Apollo lies, forcing his voice to sound casual, to not crack on two words. He can lie to Klavier. He can ask Klavier these things that he can’t ask Phoenix because he can lie to Klavier. “With everything that goes on, you never know. And sometimes I’m not sure anyone would tell me unless I ask specifically, so, just making sure.” He shrugs. He thinks even the that shrug would be illuminated red, if Apollo were watching someone else make these same motions. 

Klavier clearly doesn’t buy that, but after several more long moments, he turns his glare to the portrait of Zak over the piano, and Apollo is able to breathe again. What would it be to live like that, as paranoid and suspicious as the likes of Clay, but with full, nearly firsthand knowledge of the exact consequences of crossing the Fair Folk. To have that compulsion to keep silent, especially in a profession so concerned with the truth. As a person so concerned with the truth as Klavier is. And then, with all that in mind—

“Er,” Apollo says. Klavier’s eyes turn back to him, still close to a glare. “I mean, I get it, what you’ve said, but then you - you told me about what you thought Mr Wright was. Him and Trucy, you told me. That.”

Klavier growls from the back of his throat but he speaks and interrupts Apollo as he’s about to consider apologizing for bringing it up. “I thought I had won, against him. That it’s all battles and backstabbing like in the Court, against him, ja? And I had…” The growl turns to more of a scoff, more disgusted, and he strips his accent away from the next words, layering them instead in bitterness. “I had beaten him in court and exposed him for what he was, a cheat and a liar, and of course that means I have won against him, ja?” 

His voice swings between two people, his and what would have been his in another life, his and the voice of the person who had really hoped to beat Phoenix. “And that I don’t have to be afraid of him” - he snorts, blowing up a few strands of hair on his forehead - “and that because I have won means that what I know is a weapon I may do what I like with. Is a warning I may issue if I so choose. Which I thought, then, the best choice would be to let you in on just enough to send you running, and you shouldn’t have to fear the repercussions of knowing because I’m the one running the show, ja? If this makes any sense.”

“A little.” He thought he was the one in charge, that he could - protect Apollo? Save him? And the way everything fell to shit after, it was Apollo who kept having to help save him. And Trucy’s not the fae-stolen child that Apollo knows - it’s Klavier. 

“At any rate, you’re better off asking your boss,” Klavier says. “Knowing how often I have been wrong.”

“Right now I just want to understand anything about Prosecutor Blackquill,” Apollo says. “And you’re both equally unhelpful.”

“As Herr Samurai may very well intend.” Klavier leans back into the couch. “So what all did happen in your trial against him? Was it a case, ach, typical of your office?” He waves his hand with a flourish in a circle, gesturing to the room around him.

“It was atypically awful,” Apollo says, deciding in that moment to leave out the part about Filch’s lie that went uncontested, and the fact that they’re going to have to go wrestle a yokai or something, because even if none of that had happened, the case still would have been a nightmare. It was a nightmare before Apollo knew that happened. “Have you ever heard of Nine-Tails Vale?”

Klavier winces, hissing his breath in through his teeth. “Nothing good ever starts with that question,” he says.

“Yeah, you know what to expect already. So Trucy has a friend who works up there—”

-

“Apollo,” Clay says, from the couch, where in front of him on the coffee table an empty carton of Chinese food lays. Apollo has not even finished closing the door behind him. “It is nearly eight. Why are you just getting home, without groceries, and if you have a good answer I might not stab you with these chopsticks.” He raises the arm that was hanging off the couch and brandishes the aforementioned improvisational weapons.

“I met up with Prosecutor Gavin after work and we went to Eldoon’s,” Apollo explains.

Clay narrows his eyes. “You can’t go to Eldoon’s on a date with someone. Haven’t I taught you better than this?”

“It wasn’t a date,” Apollo says. “What, you think I asked him out on the anniversary of me getting his brother arrested for murder? Who do you think I am?” 

Someone actually brave enough to ask out Klavier Gavin at all, for starters.

“Well, if it was a date I was going to let you off without being stabbed,” Clay says. “But you’ve unfortunately done this to yourself.”

“Uh huh,” Apollo says, grabbing the chopsticks out of his hand as he passes by the couch. “I’m terrified.”

“You should be! Hey!” Clay drapes himself halfway over the back of the couch. “Don’t walk away! I’m telling you that you need to stop your stupid pining and—”

“I am not - I have never been—”

“I can tell when you’re texting him because you get this look on your face—”

“You guess when I’m texting him because I text three people, besides you.”

“Wait, you have three entire other people besides me?” Clay asks. “I’m impressed. But also I’m right about your stupid face and—”

“Just because he’s pretty and I willingly talk to him doesn’t mean that he’s not insufferable or that I’m in love with him. What are you saying?” Apollo throws the chopsticks back at him. 

He is not and has never been pining, especially not for Klavier, who’s even more of a goddamn mess of issues than Apollo knew yesterday. Pining implies, to him, that if there was the opportunity to be in a relationship with Klavier, he would take it - and the problem with that concept, one of the problems, is reciprocity. Is the fact that Klavier can say that he wants to repress it all, but he’s talking. He’s talking and exposing the roaches to the light and Apollo, won’t, can’t, has repression figured out so much better because Kristoph might be here in a prison nearby and Apollo knew him but Nahyuta is a world away. Apollo could bury him. 

And if - if, if - they were - he and Klavier - if Klavier keeps trying to grapple with the past, keeps asking Apollo’s help, one day he’s going to say something that hits too close, hurts too much. Another something about brothers, about lives that could have been. And he’s going to see it written on Apollo’s face and he might ask Apollo to open up to burn out the dark, to have the awkward conversation.

And that’s the one thing Apollo knows he can’t do, not for anyone, not Clay or Trucy or Klavier, not for the world. 

[wardencommanderrodimiss]

Okay, so Gregory ends up with like what, eight grandkids? Klavier, Sebastian, Kay, Pearl, Trucy, Athena, Apollo, and sort of Simon. Yeah like eight. What is his opinion on these baby lawyers that keep showing up in his house? (Bonus: Ray's opinions on them.)

At its core this AU is actually “Gregory accidentally adopts two family’s worth of children, has no idea how it happened” and I love it. By the time Mia and Maya return from Kurain like “so our aunt tried to kill us/frame us for murder and we stole took custody of our little cousin” Gregory is like “well this might as well happen, let me know if you ever need any help”. He figures Pearl will be the closest he ever has to a grandchild because both his actual kids are gay workaholics. He accepts this. 

Like by that point Gregory has already actually adopted Franziska, had Larry and Phoenix hanging around so long that they’re basically family, had Ray decide that he’s family, laid claim to Maya as another child, and Ema is also chilling around the house all the time. This man has so many wayward children and Maya is probably where he realizes that this is just going to keep happening. This is what his life is: Mia’s in the hospital in a coma, the blame for who attacked her is pinballing around the group, Maya has just been let off the hook and now Diego is the accused with Phoenix as some sort of accomplice (since they were the two that went to confront White) and Miles goes and picks Maya up from the detention center and brings her home to Gregory since what else is she supposed to do, go home to Mia’s empty apartment? And Gregory takes one look at this girl, Franziska’s age, eyes all red and puffy from crying, having gone through hell of finding her sister nearly dead and being accused of it, clinging to Miles’ arm because he more than anyone can sympathize with her situation, and he’s like “okay I guess I have another daughter now” and she just crashes there until Mia recovers. 

And then later, when Lana is arrested, Ema goes to Mia for help since she knows in law school they were friends “intellectually attracted” dated for a while and Mia’s like “if you don’t want to stay at your sister’s apartment alone, my place doesn’t have any space since Maya’s here from Kurain currently, but I know a man who might be willing to take you” and Ema crashes at Gregory’s until Lana is acquitted. She and Franziska hit it off and Gregory is really very glad that Franziska is making some friends her own age, because really until Ema and Maya, Franziska’s only friends are Miles, Phoenix, and Larry.

By Pearl it’s just habit, like hey here’s another kid we’re adding to this family.

Kay and Sebastian never actually crash at the house - Kay loudly and aggressively follows Franziska home and declares them family, and Gregory kind of has no idea what to do with his chaotic crow daughter. He appreciates her ambition but is not subtle at trying to channel her toward anything more legitimate than “Great Thief." 

Sebastian gets kind of overwhelmed by Fran’s giant and extremely supportive family, so he’s more on the side and doesn’t integrate himself so well with everyone besides Franziska, Kay, Ema, and Ray, but he notices that Fran is not subtly foisting her dad on him as a replacement dad. He doesn’t know how to respond to this. Gregory meanwhile is also like "Franziska I see what you’re doing, I guess I’m his father now” and even when Sebastian doesn’t come around for a while - he’s kind of afraid of being rejected by Fran’s family of brilliant lawyers even though she assures him that they all have accepted Larry - Gregory and Ray are always asking Franziska about how he’s doing and she makes sure that Sebastian knows they are checking in on him.

Gregory loves Trucy. He loves his new granddaughter. His happiness at having his own grandchild - “Father, you know that she is Phoenix’s daughter, not mine, and he and I aren’t together, you know that?” “Miles, she obviously thinks of you as her father. Don’t let her down. She’s my granddaughter” - almost outweighs the amount he wants to lecture Phoenix about the follies of taking in a child when you don’t know how to raise a child and when you also don’t have a way of supporting yourself let alone a child. (Everyone else lectures Phoenix very much so it’s fine that Gregory doesn’t. It’s not like he’s not getting lectured.) 

Ray is absolutely baffled by everything Phoenix is doing but he loves Trucy and he and Trucy are Cool Hat Bros and they go hat shopping a lot and he is in the front-row seats at her magic shows whenever he possibly can. He’ll rearrange whatever commitments he can and he will also brag about her to everyone, he’s like “my super-cool niece is an amazing magician and everyone should come to all her shows ever.”

I feel like Apollo might remind Gregory of Ray when he was younger, a little - loud and eager to learn. He doesn’t spend that much time with Apollo, though; the one who does is Ray. Ray takes a shine to Apollo and takes up a mentor role to him. Apollo is, honestly, unsure whether he works at the Wright Anything Agency or the Edgeworth Law Offices, and this question of who is his boss is one off the less pressing questions that associating with the Edgeworth-Fey extended family gives him. Apollo is honestly overwhelmed by all of these people who are barging into his life and there are so many of them and for a kid who grew up an orphan, with no one, he has no idea what to make of whatever’s going on here.

Gregory loves all of these baby idiots who keep stumbling into his life and he insists that everyone gather together for dinner fairly frequently - I think it probably goes from once every two weeks to once a month to “once a month and we have no idea who’s gonna be there on any evening” because trying to wrangle so many lawyers together in the same place at the same time is quite difficult. 

The first time Apollo comes to a family dinner is because Trucy drags him and he doesn’t quite realize what he’s in for but he does know “Isn’t it kinda weird to go to dinner with my boss’ family at my boss’ dad’s house?” and Trucy says “It’s only weird if you make it weird, Polly” and Apollo pretty much decides this is probably still one of the most normal things that’s happened to him since he met Phoenix so he rolls with it. And I feel like probably only half the family is there, like him and Trucy, Phoenix, Miles, Franziska, Ray, Gregory, and Misty, and Apollo’s like “oh this is a manageable amount of people” and then the next time, everyone is there and he’s like “oh god what is this”.

Athena and Simon I’ll comment on once I figure out their place in this AU, but no one has any idea what to make of Klavier. Like? Apollo and Trucy talk about him occasionally, before That Trial, and then after they’re all pretty assured that he’s not corrupt and is a good kid, but Franziska never really mentions him until one day she shows up late to dinner with Klavier in tow and the only person she warned in advance was Apollo, who’s like “holy shit I kind of thought you were kidding when you texted me that,” and while everyone’s boggling at the fact that Franziska brought her hated rival home she’s just like “hey we’re keeping this one”.