#if they were put against each other in a fight klavier would be like what i'm not doing that. while klaus would start biting immediately | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

write-like-wright · 3 years

Text

Your First Kiss With Them: Prosecutors Edition

A lovely anon requested first kiss headcanons with both defense lawyers and prosecutors, so I'm just gonna do it in two parts.

Miles Edgeworth

It happens spontaneously with Miles.

You'd gone on a few dates already and he always walks you to your door, like the gentleman he is. When it's time to say goodbye, he lingers for a moment, as if unsure how to proceed. He always flakes in the end, leaving you after an awkward hug and a face that matches the colour of his suit.

One day you're just at his place. It's one of those lazy days when you order takeout and sit at home binging Steel Samurai. A funny scene comes on, something that leaves you both in stitches. It's such a sweet thing, seeing him laugh so earnestly, some colour rising to his face. You lean over and press a kiss to his lips almost instinctively and he freezes for a second and so do you once you realise what you'd done. You apologise awkwardly, fearing you'd crossed a line.

"What are you sorry for? I quite liked that," Miles laughs. "At least one of us has enough courage to act."

Franziska von Karma

Happens in the middle of an argument, most likely. Nothing serious, of course. You're just bickering over something silly and Franziska gets a bit too smug with her comebacks. It annoys you to no end, seeing that smarmy grin on her lovely face. You stand there for a second, feeling an overwhelming urge to-

"Why are you glaring at me like that? Just because I'm right doesn't give you the excuse to act like a f-"

Silence. Cut off by a kiss.

She's completely dumbfounded when you part. It takes her a moment to regain her composure.

"Well," she says eventually. "How foolish of you. Trying to win an argument through such underhanded tactics."

You keep on bickering.

She kisses you not two minutes later when she realises her argument makes no sense and you gain the upper hand.

Diego Armando/Godot

It's the classic scenario with him.

He takes you out for a cup of coffee one rainy afternoon. You sit at the coffee shop for hours, talking and laughing, enjoying each other's company. It's dark outside before you even realise it and he offers to walk you home. The conversation keeps flowing on your way to your place and you feel a pang of sadness when it's time to say your goodbyes. You tell him how much you enjoyed your date and he just casually leans in for a kiss that lasts a bit longer than you'd expected. There's no way your neighbours won't gossip about it tomorrow.

Klavier Gavin

He texts you to wear something warm before your date. You're confused but oblige.

Klav shows up on his bike to pick you up and it all makes sense suddenly. "Come on, Schatzi, I'll show you what a real adrenaline rush feels like."

He's true to his word. He drives you around the city, the cool twilight air rushing past you and you feel more alive than ever.

Eventually, he takes you to his favourite spot, a clearing overlooking the entire city. It feels surreal seeing all the city lights intertwine with the stars above. You sit on his bike while he stands in front of you, talking about something or another. It's hard to say who leans in first, but soon enough you're kissing. It's your first kiss together, then the second and third and fourth...

Simon Blackquill

You're just fooling around at his place.

Simon is a massive tease when he drops his twisted persona. He picks little fights and picks on you just to get you worked up. It's a mixture of endearing and annoying.

He puts on some stupid show you're not interested in one bit. Neither is he, but he'd rather tease you about it than change the channel.

"Give me the remote, Simon."

"Come get it, *insert dumb nickname*"

You try and fail spectacularly. It's just play wrestling, but that doesn't change the fact he's twice your size and can pin you down with one-fifth of his weight. Not that you mind.

You're both giggling breathlessly at this point. "Do you yield, miscreant?" He asks in his scariest prosecutor voice. Dumbass. "I yield, I yield! Just let me go!"

"You must pay the toll first," he deadpans, crossing his arms.

"And what is the toll?"

"A kiss, if I recall correctly."

You buy your freedom and he lets you up, handing you the remote and letting you curl up against him on the sofa.

You pay his toll a few more times during the evening.

Nahyuta Sahdmadhi

You're very hesitant to kiss Yuti.

He's a monk. You're not even sure it's allowed.

You start wondering if you'd perhaps been misunderstanding your outings. They were clearly dates, you thought, but then again he could merely see them as you acting as his tour guide to introduce him to your culture. You're very torn on the matter.

On your way home from dinner, you pick up some dessert. Nothing fancy, just cupcakes from a local bakery. You eat them at your place while trying to explain the concept of Netflix and chill to him. It's hard to say if he's scandalized or intrigued.

"These are so good! Would you like a taste?" You ask with your mouth full, perhaps overexaggerating your food-induced moaning.

He gives you one of those sweet, gentle looks he's known for. "Certainly," he says, bridging the gap between you, pressing the softest of kisses to your lips. You're confused by his actions but you'd be lying if you said you minded.

"What was that about?"

"Hm? Oh, that was a pick-up line, was it not? I've heard about those. Although I hear that one is usually used with flavoured lipgloss."

"Yuti, I was just offering you some of my cupcakes."

"Oh," he seems a bit embarrassed now. "Do forgive me then."

"I didn't say I minded. But you can't just go around kissing people like that."

"I'll jot that down in my 'How to act like a native' notebook."

Barok van Zieks

(Heavily inspired by my incessant bugging of @bailey-reaper from my main)

It happens during his University days.

Barok approaches you at a gathering, completely red-faced while Klint and Albert snicker within earshot. He asks you to dance with him in the most roundabout way possible, to the point where you're not quite sure what he's asking of you.

You agree and are surprised at how good of a dancer he is in spite of his initial and apparent awkwardness. Must be those long, elegant legs.

He takes you on a stroll after and you end up alone on a balcony. His initial nervous demeanour slowly melts away, although he's still more than a little shy. You chat away and you even get a laugh out of him at some point. It's one of your personal victories.

It's almost midnight when you are interrupted. "Ah, brother, there you are!" Klint van Zieks suddenly joins you on the balcony. His lips curl in a knowing smirk as he turns to greet you. "Mother has sent me to get you aeons ago! I've been looking for you all over. It's time to leave. Say your goodbyes, and be quick." He leaves then, giving you a moment of privacy.

"I-I, hm, I have really enjoyed your company tonight. Thank you for the dance. I fear I must be going now."

"Wait," you say placing your hand on his arm, half expecting him to recoil. He doesn't. You get on your tip-toes and you can still barely reach his face. Thankfully, he's already slouching. You press a quick, chaste kiss to his lips, hoping no one saw you. "Surely, you wouldn't have left me without a kiss goodnight?"

His face is burning now and he swallows. "Pray, forgive the discourtesy. How careless I am. I'll bear it in mind for next time." With that, he turns and leaves you.

Kazuma Asogi

He walks up to you one day right as you're about to head to your next class, looking pensive and excited at once. You know why, you'd heard the news. Kazuma had been selected for the student exchange and you were thrilled for him - no one deserved it more than he did. You just hoped you did a good job of hiding how sad you were to see him leave regardless.

"I can't leave you here without a proper goodbye. Leave your books, come on." He convinces you to skip the rest of your classes and drags you away on an adventure as he calls it.

You spend the day together, joking around, getting food and window shopping. Finally, you settle under the shade of a tree where you usually met up in secret. He babbles away about the law, the British Empire, his plans for the future.

When he runs out of topics to talk about, he goes quiet, dark eyes searching your face. "Do you know why I stole you away today?" Stole? He's so dramatic. You shake your head. "I don't want you to forget me when I'm gone. Remember this day, and me and this." With that, he gently takes your face in his hands and leans in, claiming your lips in a heated kiss. It's so intense, you feel yourself burning under his touch. Tears prickle your eyes when you part. "I hate to so you go," you whisper weakly and he gives you a sad, understanding smile. "I know. I'm so sorry." You pull him into another kiss, lying down on the grass, hidden by the shade of the tree. You're not about to let him forget you either.

#ace attorney #the great ace attorney #dai gyakuten saiban #miles edgeworth #franziska von karma #diego armando #godot #klavier gavin #simon blackquill #nahyuta sahdmadhi #barok van zieks #kazuma asogi #headcanons #x reader #can you tell who my favourites are from this yes you can hi simon barok and kazuma how you doing babes #did i tag everyone i hope so

372 notes · View notes

swansstuff · 4 years

Text

So uh, I've been thinking about a hypothetical Trucy Wright: Act Attorney and here is the very poorly written outline for it because yeah. No spoilers except the Apollo Trucy thing. Tw death, murder, blood and grieving so yeah.

Trucy's first case is literally her first ever case. This is a flashback case. We follow her as she wakes up, slightly stressed about today, Phoenix gives her cereal and a pep talk and a cryptic message. Trucy asks where Papa is, it is Miles, they are married. Phoenix is cryptic about that too. He stays behind as he "has to buy groceries" so Trucy heads into the office. Apollo greets her, it's clear they know they're siblings, and he hands her a case. Miles is prosecuting. She is fucking terrified. She goes to the crime scene, Gumshoe is the detective and he's educating his teenage sons, constant confusion of who's who, because they are twins and they look very like Gumshoe, it'll be kinda funny. Its a simple investigation. During the investigation, the player can check Trucy's profile and the profile system shows character's middle names now. We get some gems such as Klavier Hyacintha Gavin later on, the reasoning behind this is coz Trucy is nosy. The important one here is Trucy Mia Wright. She says something about how she chose her own middle name when Phoenix adopted her and she chose Mia after learning about her. Yada yada. Trucy wins the case. Edgeworth is very proud, Phoenix is in the gallery and there's a flash of him crying proud tears, Apollo hugs her afterwards, Athena congrats her.

Next case, flash forward three years later, we do not see Phoenix and nobody really mentions him. Thats because he's fucking dead but we don't know that yet. This case is a Fey case, we meet Maya who is married to Franziska and they're technically on honeymoon in Kurain and Pearl becomes the Maya to Trucy's Phoenix. Its another fey murder case. There are a few mentions of Trucy's admiration of Mia, mainly just a mirror of a few lines she's said and a conversation where her and Maya talk about her, Trucy says she would have loved to meet her and Maya explains how her spirit has been dormant for ages now and how she assumes she's moved on.

"If you want I can try and channel-"

"No no no no NO. Its ok!"

This is our first hint that Phoenix is no longer with us, but we don't know until later thats what she means. Sebastian is the prosecutor, the player finds out that Miles is taking a break from prosecuting work, Trucy already knew of course, and Sebastian is dubbed Chief until he comes back, Fran says

"It would've been me were I not on my literal honeymoon right now." We are not told why yet, but it is because of Phoenix. Kay Faraday is the detective, somebody murders someone and frames Maya, no-one is shocked by this. We also get an update on Iris, she's thriving. She wins yada yada.

Next case, a couple of months later, Trucy gets a call from a friend that the player can't identify at first. Its Katrielle Layton. She needs Trucy's legal knowledge because someone is sueing her detective agency because have you seen how they practice. This, of course, turns to murder and we get another surprise when we meet the prosecutor. Who probably has a licence to practise law in England? Simon Blackquill, he is British ok. Yeah, Trucy wins with Kat's help, we meet Ernest and Sherl and Alfendi and Flora if we have time. I miss them. Trucy and Kat have a conversation that cryptically addresses their fathers and their "whereabouts" and living up to their legacy. We see Trucy cry, but only a similar flash to AJ:AA and we do not know why. Yet.

Next case, flashback case. Trucy is the assistant on this case but we still play as her, even in the court sections since Phoenix is prepping her for the bar and getting her to give him the answers. The bar exam is only in three days. Klavier is prosecuting. The case somehow relates to Kristoph and there's the whole mirror dynamic thing of when Phoenix lost his badge. Kristoph is dead by now, but the whole thing is there was a plot inside prison to make Phoenix pay for putting a bunch of them in, Kristoph was the assumed ring leader until he died and the cops now dont know who's running it. Somebody (Godot? That would hurt big time) was their inside man, sent to figure that out, so when whoever it was turned up dead, the whole thing got exposed. We get a bit of a Mia moment in the trial where Trucy tells Phoenix to flip over the receipt (thats evidence for some reason). Phoenix says "I feel like that shouldn't be the second time someone has said that to me". The killer is found, by Phoenix, and put into isolation, as have most of the other participants. We then see Trucy get her badge. They have a conversation and Trucy says Phoenix basically forgot about it for a couple of months. The case closes with a foreboding "and I forgot about it too, until..."

Next case. Phoenix is fucking murdered. Trucy gets a phone call late at night, she hears laboured breathing on the other end and a "don't forget I love you" from Phoenix. Trucy pulls a simba and goes "dad? Dad?!!" And the line goes dead. The player is presented with a choice of who to call. They have two phone calls. Who they choose first makes no difference, but the second time they are forced to choose Ema who will trace Phoenix's phone call. They could call Apollo and he would comfort her, Miles would panic, Maya would say he was just messing around, Athena would sense her distress and say she's coming over etc. You could attempt to call Phoenix back but he would not answer and you would be allowed to call someone else. Ema then traces the phone call and we follow Trucy to the crime scene. We get a truly haunting cutscene where everything kinda goes blurry except Phoenix's face and the blood. Trucy doesn't cry. She stands there in shock. The WAA is there in various states of shock and upset. Return of grieving Apollo I guess. Miles turns up and the look on his face is haunting. Trucy and him make eye contact and they share the thought of something has to be done. And then. "The bar association took me off the case and Papa too, they said we were too close to it. As a result, we never found out who did it... Until now." And we see a determined Trucy face. We jump forward to where we last saw Trucy, she and Pearl are coming back from England and its a bit more cheery. Trucy sends Pearl on a train back to Kurain and heads on home. She enters the house and we see Miles pouring over Phoenix's case. He jumps up and runs towards her.

"Trucy! I think I have a lead, I-"

"Papa, you're tired, go to bed." (Or better dialogue along those lines)

Its clear he's been doing this sort of thing a lot.

"But I do! At least...I think I do..."

He trails off and rests his head in his hands.

"Do I? Or am I just a mess?"

Trucy gives him a sad smile.

"C'mon let's go to bed."

Miles returns the sad smile and fades out like all ace attorney characters do. The player is given the option to look around. There's probably some emotional dialogue and bits that give clues to how she and Miles have been fairing the past 3 years. Answer is, not very well. Examine the pile of papers on the table. Trucy will take a look and then realise her papa may have actually been onto something. Its a diagram of which prisoners knew each other, with an arrow from each leading to a defense attorney we have never met. Trucy is confused, but she calls for Miles anyway. He comes back downstairs and Trucy asks him about this lead he found.

"Well I realised all those prisoners would know this defense attorney (insert name?)"

"Why? And why would they be suspicious?'

"They (pronouns?) Were always the defense attorney who would take on the cases of those Wright had already accused. They gained a reputation of being the doomed defense attorney."

"So... They knew all the prisoners in the plot and they had a grudge against daddy... Papa I think you're onto something!"

And the case continues, since we already know who's been accused, it plays out more like an investigations game, Trucy has to prove it, with Miles' help of course, literally every other character we know and love plays a part in making sure this guy gets a guilty verdict. There is still a courtroom bit and a moment when all is looking dark, Trucy literally has a full on breakdown as the Judge threatens to remove her from the case again. Miles is by her side, they're both technically prosecution here i guess. Miles, however, is too deep in his own mental breakdown to help. Everyone else is in the gallery besides Pearl. Pearl channels Phoenix as a last hope sort of thing. Phoenix comforts her and tells her to keep fighting, he touches her badge and probably says some sort of bullshit about it. The Judge is about to bang the gavel when Trucy and Phoenix object at the same time. Miles looks up and realises whats going on and he objects too, a little later. The battle goes on until it finishes and the other attorney has a breakdown that steals little bits from every other murderer Phoenix has put behind bars.This is the one time seeing the word guilty on your screen feels good. There's a whole heartwarming celebration at the end, Phoenix sticks around for a little bit and everyone gets a bit of closure. Its assumed he's gone since Pearl passes out and Trucy dips out for a sec. She's away from the festivities, staring at the badge in her hand and we see someone coming up behind her. Maya is channelling Phoenix now. He gives Trucy a hug and utters the words "the only time a lawyer can cry is when its all over and, Trucy darling, my light, its over." Echoing both Diego and Mia.

And the screen fades to black with a final hug between father and daughter.

#ace attorney #my writing #trucy wright #miles edgeworth #phoenix wright #maya fey #franziska von karma #pearl fey #professor layton sorta #etc i cba to tag everyone #tw death #tw grieving #tw blood #tw murder #:)#wrightworth #franmaya

69 notes · View notes

flight-of-the-sacred-eagle · 4 years

Text

Found Out

This is very angsty and could be taken as abusive so if anything close to familial abuse is triggering to you, read at your own digression.

“So, how does it feel to actually win a case?” Apollo asked as he looked at Klavier, grin on his face.

“You say that as if it is a rare occurrence,” Klavier said as he made his way over to Apollo. Apollo chuckled as he walked over to Klavier.

“This is the first time you’ve ever won against me,” he pointed out as he smiled up at his boyfriend. “You were absolutely amazing, you know that?” He asked as he wrapped his arms Klavier.

“Not as amazing as you were,” Klavier mumbled as he hugged Apollo back. “It’s a shame you lost,” he said.

“The guy was guilty,” Apollo said with a shrug. “It’s only natural that he got caught,” he said as they quickly pulled away. “Besides, by the end of that, I just kind of wanted it to end,” he admitted. Klavier snorted.

“You and me both, schatzi,” he said as he shook his head. “That was… quite the case,” he said.

“You said it,” Apollo mumbled. “But that doesn’t diminish how amazing you were in there,” he said as he quickly grabbed Klavier’s necklace. “We’ll celebrate your win tonight,” he whispered before he pulled Klavier down by his necklace, pulling him into a quick kiss.

“Apollo?!”

Apollo froze, eyes going wide as he quickly pulled away from Klavier, letting go of his necklace as he turned to face his boss. “Hey, Mr. Wright,” he said weakly as he shuffled away from Klavier, face heating up.

“Don’t you ‘hey, Mr. Wright’ me!” Phoenix exclaimed as he marched over to the two, his tone causing Apollo to flinch. He had never seen Phoenix this angry before. “What the hell are you doing?!” He asked.

“U-um, let me expla-“

“He’s working for a murderer!” Phoenix continued, causing Klavier to wince. “You know what a horrible person he is!” He exclaimed. Apollo’s eyes narrowed.

‘Oh, you did not just say that,’ he thought. “Excuse me?!” He exclaimed, anger bubbling up in him. “You have know idea what kind of person Klav is!” He exclaimed. Phoenix snorted.

“He works for a murderer!” He exclaimed. “You can’t exactly be a good person and do that,” he said.

“Hey! Nothing was ever proven!” Apollo snapped. “And Mr. Gavin is his only family- so of course Klavier will want to stay close to him!” He exclaimed.

“Kristoph is his only family?” Phoenix asked. “Well that explains a lot,” he said.

“What is that supposed to mean?!” Apollo asked as he crossed his arms.

“It means that it explains why Prosecutor Gavin over there is a manipulative asshole like Kristoph,” Phoenix said.

“DON’T YOU DARE TALK TO MY BOYFRIEND LIKE THAT!” Apollo exclaimed, anger blazing in his eyes. “HE IS NOT MANIPULATIVE!” He cried, not even bothering to control how loud he got.

“Obviously he is!” Phoenix exclaimed. “You’re a hell of a lot smarter than this!” He exclaimed. “I mean, trusting a prosecutor who would get rid of everyone who stands in his way just so he can win?!” He asked. “That’s almost as insane as getting someone disbarred over a damn mistake!” Apollo rolled his eyes.

“It’s not his fault that you didn’t have enough common sense to question where the hell the diary page came from!” He spat. “I mean seriously- why the hell do you think I refused to take the card Trucy gave me?!” He asked.

“DON’T YOU DARE PUT THAT ON ME!” Phoenix snapped eyes blazing with anger. “YOU HAVE NO IDEA WHAT I’VE GONE THROUGH BECAUSE OF YOUR BOYFRIEND!” He cried. “DO YOU KNOW HOW MANY TIMES TRUCY AND I ALMOST LOST THE OFFICE?! YOU HAVE NO IDEA WHAT HAPPENED!” He yelled. “HE DESTROYED TRUCY AND I’S LIVES!” He exclaimed.

“YOU DID THAT!” Apollo snapped. “YOU DIDN’T EVEN BOTHER LOOKING FOR A BETTER JOB, DID YOU?! YOU JUST DECIDED TO RELY ON YOUR EIGHT YEAR OLD DAUGHTER FOR EVERYTHING!” He exclaimed.

“DON’T YOU BRING HER INTO IT!” Phoenix exclaimed. “SHE HAS NOTHING TO DO WITH THE FACT THAT YOU’RE DATING A FUCKING GAVIN!” He exclaimed.

“He’s dating a what?” Kristoph asked as he stepped into the lobby, the glare on his glasses completely obscuring his eyes as he stalked forwards. The room went completely silent as he paused right in front of Klavier. “Is that true? Are you dating Mr. Justice?” He asked, voice causing both Apollo and Klavier to gulp.

“Y-yes...” Klavier squeaked out as Apollo grabbed his hand. Kristoph frowned.

“I thought you were smarter than that,” he said, voice cold. “Trusting anyone from that group of idiots pretending to be an agency will get you thrown in prison,” he said, eyes shifting towards Phoenix. “And they aren’t above forging evidence to get what they want,” he said.

“Oh yes, because I totally ordered the forged diary page,” Phoenix said sarcastically. “Drop the act Gavin, you and I both know you and Prosecutor Gavin ordered it and planted it on me,” he said. “And then you tried to frame me for a murder you committed,” he said.

“I had nothing to do with the diary page!” Klavier exclaimed.

“I was completely acquitted of the murder of Shadi Smith,” Kristoph said. “And Klavier was just doing his job,” he said. “Although, it seems your protégée is trying to get him to abandon his job,” he said before smirking. “Frankly I’m surprised he didn’t tried to get Klavier convicted of murder,” he said.

“Hey! Apollo would never do that!” Klavier exclaimed, squeezing Apollo’s hand tighter. Apollo just squeezed his eyes shut.

“No he wouldn’t,” Phoenix agreed. “Because unlike you and your brother, he actually knows what being a lawyer is all about,” he said.

“HEY! KLAV KNOWS EXACTLY WHAT BEING A LAWYER IS ABOUT!” Apollo exclaimed, eyes flying open.

“That’s rich coming from a traitor and a forger,” Kristoph said with a snort. “Do either of you know anything besides how to bluff and accuse those close to you of murder?” He asked.

“Apollo is an amazing lawyer!” Klavier exclaimed. “He can find out lies just by reading body language!” He exclaimed.

“You are a murderer!” Phoenix cried at the same time. “And frankly, I’d be surprised if being a murderer wasn’t a trait that ran in the family,” he spat.

“Are you accusing my brother of murder?!” Kristoph exclaimed, raising his voice for the first time. “Are you really-“

“THAT’S ENOUGH!” Apollo screamed, invoking his chords of steel and yelling with enough force that both Kristoph and Phoenix slapped their hands against their ears.

“Liebling?” Klavier asked as Apollo panted in rage.

“I’m done,” Apollo spat as he glared at both Phoenix and Kristoph, who were both slowly uncovering their ears. “I’m done dealing with your shit,” he said. “I’m done having everything projected onto me,” he said. “You two are acting like fucking toddlers!” He exclaimed. “You keep saying it’s for the greater good, but neither of you care about that!” He cried. “All you care about is fighting!” He exclaimed. “It took us months to work up the courage to date each other because you two are too damn stubborn to believe that maybe you’re wrong!” He exclaimed.

“Apollo, please, you’re overreact-“

“Is he?” Klavier asked, voice cold as he draped an arm around Apollo. “Or are you just upset because he’s right?” He asked. “You two have absolutely no idea what either of us are like, yet you shove the idea that one of us is a terrible person down the other’s throat,” he hissed. “You use us as your pawns to fight the other, and I’m sick of it,” he said.

“Klavier, you have no idea what you’re talking about,” Kristoph hissed. “I’d recommend you be quiet before you say something you regret,” he said.

“Why? You afraid he’s going to reveal that you’re an actual murderer and forger?” Phoenix asked.

“Oh, shut up,” Apollo snarled as he glared at the two of them. “I hate you two. And you know what?” He said as he reached up and unpinned his badge, looked up at Klavier and nodding. “I refuse to be a part of this any longer. I quit.” And with that, he tossed his badge at Phoenix.

“Find yourself a new pawn, Kristoph,” Klavier spat as he grabbed his badge from his pocket and threw it at Kristoph. “Come on, schatzi. We’re leaving.” He said.

Apollo felt Klavier grab his hand as they stormed out, leaving a speechless Phoenix and Kristoph behind them. Ignoring the fans and reporters, they quickly made their way to the garage.

“You know they’re going to try to pull us back in, right?” Klavier asked as Apollo climbed onto Klavier’s motorcycle.

“I know,” Apollo said. “If we actually want a chance to escape everything, we can’t stay here,” he said. Klavier nodded.

“We can’t exactly stay in California,” he said before sighing. “Or the states,” he added as the sounds of screaming fans started to fill their ears. “I’m too famous- I’d be recognized instantly,” he said before frowning. “Actually... I don’t think we can go to a lot of countries... between the Internet and how many tours I’ve done, there aren’t many places I could even go to,” he said. Apollo just smiled.

“Why don’t I take you back to my home?” He asked. “My actual home,” he added.

“What do you mean?” Klavier asked. “Where exactly are you from?”

“Have you ever heard of Khura’in?”

#tw parental figure abuse #tw arguing #klapollo #klavier gavin #bad idea au #apollo justice #phoenix wright #kristoph gavin

15 notes · View notes

rivalsforlife · 5 years

Note

rank the prosecutor themes!!!

Okay!! I’ll do you one better and do all the main rival themes (meaning: I’m including Shi-Long Lang and Justine Courtney in here too. despite Lang probably being very displeased at being grouped in with prosecutors. sorry.) uuunfortunately I am going to get into spoilery territory with this one, but I’ll do this in reverse order, so you can skip the spoiler parts because they’re my favourite ones haha, and I will warn for them.

First, a disclaimer: All the prosecutor themes are fantastic. that is all.

12 - Great Revival - Franziska von Karma: I adore Franziska, but she needs her own leitmotif. This one is basically the same as Miles’ Great Revival, except higher and with a different intro, from what I could tell. and I’m not even sure if the sound gets revamped for the Investigation games…? I can’t quite remember. ANYWAYS, what really made this the lowest of the prosecutor themes for me is that they also use this theme for MANFRED VON KARMA in AAI2, because I guess they didn’t want to create a whole new theme for him when he only shows up for part of a flashback case. So they borrowed his daughter’s. This is a DISGRACE, because Miles Franziska and Manfred are all very different characters and deserve to have distinct leitmotifs. Especially since the whole idea of the Great Revival is that it’s them coming out from underneath Manfred’s shadow/unlearning his techniques, since this plays when Franziska comes in with the evidence to save everyone in Farewell, my Turnabout, I think. So having Manfred have the anti-MVK song is not good.

11- Zacharias Barnham - The Sword of Labyrinthia: things get difficult now because all the songs are good. I’m putting this one here for a couple of reasons, namely because I first listened to this song while going through PLvsAA on 2x speed on youtube because otherwise it would take too long, so I heard this song at 2x speed and now it just feels too slow to me. I said these rankings were going to be very subjective, right…? also it would have been great if they actually finished Barnham’s character arc, you know. Darklaw doesn’t really have a leitmotif so she’ll be missing from this list, by the way, I didn’t just forget that she existed.

10 - Nahyuta Sahdmadhi - The Last Rites Prosecutor: it’s a pretty song. I like how it actually uses what sounds like a human chorus in there, which is distinct from pretty much all AA music? I especially like the part near the end of the loop where it gets all kind of suspended in a sort of “floating in the void”-like feeling, at least to me. It’s down here though because I… don’t really get an “opponent” vibe from him. I don’t listen to this and think to myself “oh, this is the guy I’m going to fight”, you know what I mean?

9 - Barok van Zieks - Grim Reaper of the Old Bailey: I like how ominous and haunting this song is, pretty fitting for a “Grim Reaper”. It’s nice to listen to, too. It just didn’t really stand out for me above all the rest, so it’s here.

8 - Simon Blackquill - Distorted Swordsmanship: similarly to van Zieks’ theme, this has a very ominous vibe to it. It’s pretty subtle for a lot of it, and it’s way less “in-your-face” than a lot of the other prosecutor themes. It suggests an opponent that isn’t going to face you head on but kind of work in the shadows and take you down without you even realizing it… which is fitting, considering Blackquill’s whole “twisted samurai” motif and the idea of psychological manipulation being his main thing. I like this one, like all of the prosecutor themes, and it’s only here because I… liked others more.

7- Miles Edgeworth - Great Revival: “Grace why did you say both Great Revivals are practically the same thing but put Miles five places above Franziska” OKAY LISTEN. There is only one “Franziska von Karma- Great Revival”. There are multiple “Miles Edgeworth - Great Revival”s, and this is about where I’d average them out. Great Revival 2002 would be ranked about the same as Franziska’s because, yeah, they’re practically the same thing. Great Revival 2013, however, has an even prettier intro, is more orchestral and therefore sounds even more regal and fitting for DD-era Miles. I am seriously considering making this my alarm to wake up to in the mornings because… it’s so pretty?

BUT I have to mention the actual orchestral versions of Great Revival, because they are phenomenal. There’s one for every Gyakuten Saiban Orchestra. The 2016 one is the first one I listened to, but it was tragically taken down… so listen to the 2019 one. All the orchestral editions are pretty much the same… but the orchestral Great Revivals have a new part around 1:30 that is just GOREGOUS. I ADORE it. That would probably shoot this one up a few rankings if they were in the games. I gasped out loud in a dead silent library upon first hearing it, it was very embarrassing. Great Revival imo sounds much prettier the more genuinely an orchestra it is. I love this song? … moving on.

6 - Shi Long Lang- Speak up, Pup: I said that Blackquill’s theme was very subtle – this is the opposite, this is about as “in-your-face” as it gets. It also sounds very cool. It has a sort of… I’m hesitant to use this term, because of how people abused it when I was in junior high, but it definitely has a sort of swagger to it. It pretty well encapsulates Lang’s character and him just… barging onto the crime scene with all his people and making hasty arrests and taking bullets, like, all that stuff I can see coming from a person with this as their leitmotif. But I just like listening to it, it’s one of those songs that has a similar effect to caffeine on my brain. It’s just very loud and cool and I enjoy it.

5 - Justine Courtney - Goddess of Law: I also really love listening to this song. It’s very regal. This song is very good in contrast with Sebastian’s First Class Farewell… like, Sebastian spends most of the time as a bit of a joke, with his light and airy theme… and then Justine comes in with this theme and you kind of feel like “oh, crap, now things are serious.” I like the use of the organ, obviously, giving it kind of a churchy feel which makes sense as she is referring to and worshipping the Goddess of Law, but I also love the faster parts of it too. It shows off her quick wit and intelligence that makes her a pretty formidable opponent for Miles in AAI2. It’s the song of someone you definitely would not want to cross… and is very pretty.

4 - Godot - The Fragrance of Dark Coffee: my feelings about Godot are… complicated and not entirely positive… but I adore his theme. He’s the first prosecutor to really have a proper leitmotif that’s all his own… and even though it’s not a “I’m so ready to fight this person” leitmotif or even a “this person’s particularly intimidating” leitmotif, it’s very laidback and relaxed. Honestly what gets this one so many points is, guess what, once again, the orchestral songs! Part of this is a lot of bias, because they replace the piano parts with the flute in the orchestral editions of this song and I played the flute for six years so I am partial towards it. But also it just… sounds extremely pretty? It’s very relaxing and… it just sounds gorgeous in the orchestra editions. I haven’t listened to the jazz version yet but I bet that would be gorgeous as well. Here’s the most recent 2019 orchestra version of this song, but the 2008 and 2016 ones are good too (my favourite being the 2016 one, which again got taken down bc copyright :( rip)

3 - Klavier Gavin - Guilty Love: out of the mainline games, AA4 has the best soundtrack imo, which is justifiable considering who the prosecutor is. Okay, this one is a huge contrast from Godot’s theme… it’s actually a huge contrast from all the prosecutor themes. The only one who comes close to this level of Rock is Lang’s theme. It’s fun, it’s upbeat, it’s soooo much fun to listen to. It really does set Klavier apart from all the other prosecutors - this isn’t the song of your enemy, this is a song of a person who’s here to find the truth and have a good time doing it. You go into the courtroom getting ready to face off against the dreaded Second Case Prosecutor, the most insufferable version of every prosecutor until now, and you get ROCK MUSIC. … literally, he apparently actually plays it in the game. which, pun intended, rocks.

This gets bonus points, of course, for being made into an actual song with lyrics that you could hypothetically sing, made by Shu Takumi. If you haven’t listened to this one yet you totally should, it’s a good time. listen to Klavier Gavin ditch his date to go to court. PARTICULARLY for the parts where Apollo’s theme gets in there. like, uh, Klavier. pining much?

– OKAY NOW SPOILER WARNING. I’m going to go into a bit of AAI2 spoilers here, nothing too major like the mastermind or anything, but if you don’t know what the deal is with Sebastian then I’d just recommend avoiding this for now. And then after that are major DGS2 spoilers, so if you haven’t played either of those games and don’t even want to look at anything remotely spoilery you can probably just skip out on the rest of this post.

2 - Sebastian Debeste’s Themes: okay, so. First Class Reasoning is just such a… light, airy, bouncy song. It sounds kind of absent, like it’s running off chasing butterflies instead of investigating a crime scene. It’s not the song of a formidable opponent (which makes the contrast with Justine Courtney’s leitmotif much better). This plays pretty notably in the one argument you have with him that’s so nonsensical it doesn’t even justify the traditional confrontation music, you have this instead.

And then in the final case you get First Class Farewell.

This sounds infinitely more mature than First Class Reasoning. The two instruments kind of do a… back and forth with each other. I think I read somewhere it’s like a tango? Whatever it is, it is something where you need to keep up with the argument and the logic, something Sebastian hasn’t been able to do… until now. It has him standing up to his father, standing on his own, and showing that he truly has the potential to be a great prosecutor. If we ever somehow see Sebastian as a prosecutor in future games, I want this to be his leitmotif. Individually these two songs wouldn’t take this spot, but put together and showcasing Sebastian’s character growth – and that First Class Farewell plays in one of the most emotional AAI2 scenes – is what brings it up here. It’s a really good use of leitmotifs.

Speaking of great use of leitmotifs…

1 - The Masked Disciple’s Leitmotif. I… cannot say anymore than this without spoiling the entirety of DGS2, so I’m actually going to put the rest under a “keep reading” if you’ve finished DGS2. So, uh, if you haven’t, just… when DGS2 is translated, play it, it’s really good. And this leitmotif might actually be my favourite song in the entire series, for reasons that are under the cut. I… really hope this works, if it doesn’t, scroll as fast as you can and don’t look back.

…

…….. so. Asougi, huh.

The Revived Prosecutor is! INCREDIBLE. At the time I’m writing this, the only way to really experience DGS2 as someone who does not know Japanese and only knows English is by watching these twitch streams, and you might notice that when this first starts playing the streamer actually pauses so we can listen to it. it’s that good.

It starts off as such an intimidating, imposing song. It’s a song of your enemy. It’s so strange, so different from the Asougi we’re used to, and you’ve really got to wonder if he’s the same person.

AND THEN SAMURAI WITH A MISSION KICKS IN. It felt like an actual, physical gut punch.

It has lacks that familiar, Japanese-y kind of feel to it, though. It’s Asougi, but it’s different. Asougi is the Samurai With A Mission, and he’s fulfilling his very murdery prosecute-y destructive mission, which is so different from the Asougi that Ryuunosuke idolized in DGS… and even though this person is so different from the Asougi we knew, it still is Asougi. It also has a few hints of the Professor’s Theme in there, which is also incredibly good considering… well.

Honestly, one of the reasons I’d want a remake of the original trilogy – like a full-on remake – is so that they’d do something like this with Miles’ themes. His “Great Revival” is good… but it doesn’t suit AA1 Miles. If we had an actual “Demon Prosecutor” theme, which was mostly replaced by DL-6 when talking about Miles’ trauma, and then get to something like Great Revival for his… well, Great Revival, that would be fantastic. That’s the one regret, that Miles came too early for ace attorney to get around to making proper leitmotifs like this.

Also again this song is just really fun to listen to. And that’s probably what’s most important here, right?

#asks #soundtrack rankings #prosecutor leitmotifs #(a separate tag so I can advertise it without adding the spoiler)#ace attorney

12 notes · View notes

crackmadhi · 5 years

Text

Every good Friendship starts with an Asshole and a Fight

Friday, 16 March 2029

“Can I truly confide you with this task?”, Edgeworth asked Klavier and Simon for the fifth time while they were walking down the corridor into the entrance hall of the prosecutor’s office.

Simon rolled his eyes but remained silent luckily enough. Klavier shot him a warning look to remind him that he better kept his mouth shut and let him deal with this. A stressed Herr Edgeworth was nothing he could not handle.

Shooting him his best smile Klavier reassured him: “Of course, you can trust us, Herr Edgeworth. We know of what importance the royal visit is for the prosecution’s office as well as for our country. We will act prudently and vigilantly to prevent any unplanned incidents. You can count on us, Herr Edgeworth!”

Edgeworth sighed and massaged his temple. He knew for a fact that Gavin and Blackquill were the most suitable men for this reception. They were his most trusted employees and also the most hardworking men in the office.

Other than that – He opened the door for the entrance hall – they also were the only ones that actually knew Your Graciousness, Nahyuta Sahdmadhi. At least indirectly.

Gavin knew him through the relationship he had with Apollo Justice and Blackquill had met him in court. The latter event had not gone down peacefully, and Edgeworth had to scold the man for the stupid stunt he pulled, as he acted as the defence’s co-council.

And still he was a better fit for this reception than any rookie that was working in the office right now. The stupidity of the situation did not fail to annoy him greatly but there was nothing to be done than work with what he had got now.

“I hope you will hold your promise, Gavin. But even if I wanted I could not do it myself, since my schedule is too tight. I’m not even pleased to take you out of your offices, since there is so much to do, but there is simply no other way. I’ll leave it to you them. Be considerate and try to look at it as a short break form the madness in the office. Or do not. At this point I don’t even care anymore”, Edgeworth mumbled and walked away.

“The chief surly is stressed as fuck”, Simon commented dryly as he looked after the man in maroon.

Klavier punched him in the arm and hissed: “Don’t talk like that about him. He could hear us.”

“As if it would surprise him that people would say such stuff about him. And I wasn’t even mean. I just stated the obvious.”

“Yeah, if you think that makes it better. Anyway, you remember that we have to greet him by his proper title and do the bow thing?”

“Yes, I know!”, Simon moaned and crossed his arms in front of his chest. “I’ll do it, but I have to say it again; it is completely stupid and irrational. You’ve spoken with him when you video chatted with your ridiculous boyfriend, and then you called each other by your names! And I think the title is hilarious and completely unfitting for the brat.”

“Cool. You’ve ranted long enough?”, Klavier said unimpressed and put his hand on his hips. “As long as you are still angry at the man for being mean towards Athena -”

“And almost putting my friend innocently behind bars because of his petty arrogance!”

“- yeah sure that too, you will refrain from talking with him. Don’t forget that he asked Athena for forgiveness and also wrote a letter to Bucky. Give him at least some credit for trying, okay Herr Samurai?”

Simon did not respond but what was new about that? Klavier was used to have a conversation on his own when the samurai was around. The man just was not much of a talker.

Frustratedly he turned towards the door and awaited the arrival of the khura’inese visitor. Not a minute later he heard the distinguish jingling of the monk’s golden jewellery, whereupon the royal man shortly followed.

A tall, buff man in a black suit was accompanying Nahyuta, surely his bodyguard. Klavier shot Simon a short look, but the tall man had put on an emotionless face, completely unreadable for a stranger.

They waited for Nahyuta to come closer, before they bowed and Klavier greeted the man with: “It is an honour to welcome you officially in LA, Your Graciousness.”

Klavier could almost feel how the monk uncomfortably shifted on his feet. Yes, this man definitely disliked it to be treated as a nobleman. He did not blame him for it, being famous had its benefits but it was exhausting.

“We hope Your Graciousness will enjoy their visit”, Simon suddenly added and straightened up again.

Klavier followed suit and saw the monk visibly relax, as they finally were able to talk on the same eye level. Now he had a better look at the monk and quickly observed the man’s demeanour. A serene smile laid on the brown lips and his hands were intertwined behind his back. Uptight and distant but in the most tranquil and gracious way possible.

“Please, let us not bother with this formality. It is not necessary for you to call me by my royal title. I will be your colleague, not your regent in the following two weeks”, Nahyuta stated calmly and looked in Klavier’s direction.

The man nodded intently and responded: “Of course! Whatever suits you best. Just call me Klavier!”

“Very well. Please feel free to call me Nahyuta, then.”

Both men glanced over to Simon, who had crossed his arms demonstratively while they had been speaking. As Klavier dangerously raised his eyebrows and additionally stared daggers at him to what the man rolled his eyes, huffed deeply and stated: “It’s Simon.”

Nahyuta did not react to this unpassionate reaction and waited for Klavier to start with their tour through the prosecution’s office. Silently Klavier gave the monk credit for ignoring Simon’s rudeness and pointed at the door leading to the corridor.

“Well, let’s get right at it and stop wasting anymore precious time!”, the blond man exclaimed and lead them the way.

The morning went by in a snap. The prosecution’s archive, the different offices, the common areas, they managed to go through it all. While doing so, Nahyuta had his bodyguard leave them, so that it was only the three of them wandering through the building.

As Klavier had expected, he had been the one who did most of the talking, but then and when Simon added something small to the conversation. It was not much but more than the rock star had hoped for. The samurai had even managed to not sound passive-aggressive towards the prince, which was hopefully a sign of Simon’s forgiveness for Nahyuta’s past behaviour.

“Anyway, now that you’ve seen all of this we are heading towards the cafeteria for lunch. In the afternoon we will go and visit the courthouse and the police HQ”, Klavier explained as they passed some elder prosecutors in the hallway.

Nahyuta still seemed to be intrigued by all the information Klavier gave him. It was refreshing to see somebody with such a curious mind for a change, reminisced the rock star happily.

“That sounds wonderful. I’m thrilled to see and learn more about the courthouse and the HQ. On my last stay there was no time for a tour like this and I’m glad that I now get the chance to catch up”, Nahyuta responded, while thankfully lowering his head towards the blond man.

Klavier was about to laugh and reply something as one of the elder prosecutors began to speak. It was a slimy, arrogant man in a mouse grey suit. He was talking with an even slimier man in a black suit and had been watching the them closely.

Klavier knew them. They had lost several trials against his brother. Simon knew them as well. Both of them had almost lost their jobs during the reformation process of the law, which the chief prosecutor had initiated after he had been freed.

Therefore, they meant bad news.

“What a great new generation, right? The enforcement, the future of the law built on the shoulders of a convicted murderer, the former pawn of a dictator and a psychopath’s little brother. That will surly work out perfectly fine, won’t it?”, the grey one told his friend annoyed.

They had their backs turned towards the younger men and acted as if they were not there. Clearly, they knew that they were heard. Their words were meant to hurt, and they knew they would do the trick.

“It surely will”, the other one bawled and slapped his knee.

“And of course,” the grey one wickedly added, “they get along effortlessly. What else could you expect from three criminals like them? Ruthless, manipulating men with no respect for us, who worked in this field much longer. I still can’t believe that the chief prosecutor was stupid enough to fall for them. Then again, Gavin might be just as biasing as his brother? He probably deceived the oblivious fool, like all his stupid little fans.”

Klavier stood still like an ice statue. He had closed his eyes and tried to sustain an even breathing pattern. For outsiders it might have looked like the man was near to explode. To Simon it looked like his friend was about to break down and cry.

It was not the first time Simon had to listen to these dickheads’ accusations. He did not care what was told about him, as long as he could do his job properly. But saying this about Klavier, the one out of these three who had not done wrong anything in his hole life, that, he could not tolerate any longer.

He turned violently, made a step into their direction-

“I beg your pardon?”

Simon stared at the monk. What on earth was going on with his voice? I sounded so icy in a creepily friendly way that it made Simon’s hair stand up.

“What did you say, Your Graciousness?”, the man in grey replied innocently.

But Nahyuta had none of that. Determined he walked towards them, his head holding high and a defeating smile on his lips.

“My, my. I did not speak quieter than you two did just before. So, do not try to make a fool out of me. Tell me clearly, what did you just speak off?”

The elder man’s expression soured. He did not like the tone Nahyuta was using.

“It was a private conversation. It is none of your business.”

The prince kept his mouth shut and closed his eyes. Slowly he lifted his hand from behind his back and formed a prayer pose with his fingers.

With a furious flick of his tongue he opened his eyes again and shot them a piercing look with those energic, passionate eyes.

“You truly believe that you openly and violently insulting my highly appreciated and helpful guide, would be none of my business? I might have been the pawn of a tyrant, but I am no longer blind to the truth. Prosecutor Gavin is a hardworking man, who loves what he does and lives for it. Making him responsible for his brother’s foul crimes is defamation. It shows the pettiness and ugliness of your wrenched soul. Might you be reborn as a mole in the stony mountains, unable to dig yourself a home and stuck in the sun’s burning rays you cannot see nor enjoy.”

The man in grey had gone paler and paler. His lips were trembling and his palms sweating. His cowardly friend had already run off and he followed right away, unable to stand the monk’s intense presence for one more second.

This. This pleased Simon. This pleased him so much.

But before he could say that to the monk, the man had turned towards Klavier. Carefully he approached him and waited for him to notice him before he started to speak.

“I hope you are alright, Klavier. These men were inhumanly nasty, I had to speak up. But if I overstepped my boundaries I apologize and promise to not interfere again in the future”, Nahyuta stated sincerely and lowered his head humbly.

Klavier looked as if he had just died a little. The cool and usually composed mask he wore all the time had broken into pieces, and now he was jittering and looked small and vulnerable. Simon stepped to his side and discreetly drew circles on the other man’s back.

Klavier needed comfort. Uneasily Nahyuta tried to catch Simon’s attention with a guilty look. The other man got the message and shook his head. No, this was not Nahyuta’s fault, he seemed to say wordlessly.

For some longer they stood still and waited for the blond to calm down. When he appeared to be stable enough again, Simon stepped aside and gave the man room to breathe.

“I hope this is not going to end badly for you, Nahyuta. These two are manipulative, horrible men. I don’t even want to think of what they might be ready to do to you”, Klavier whispered worriedly and warily observed the prince’s behaviour.

Nahyuta did not seem to be bothered to much by the potential dread coming from those men.

“I don’t think”, Nahyuta stated with a smug smile on his delicate lips, “that they can say much against the prince of Khura’in. They are cowards and I cannot believe that they have enough guts to tell the chief prosecutor that they got into a fight with the very important international visitor.”

“He’s right. They are too scared to do anything, trust us, Klav”, Simon soothingly affirmed Nahyuta’s statement.

Klavier still looked troubled but said nothing else. Simon suppressed a sigh and decided that it was better to leave it at this.

Firmly he looked from one to the other and proposed: “Let’s continue this weird tour and go to the cafeteria. Food might be the right distraction right now.”

Both men nodded in union and followed Simon to the cafeteria.

Link

#ace attorney #ferienreblog

2 notes · View notes

wardencommanderrodimiss · 5 years

Text

Chapter Eight: these are not valid investigative procedures, Phoenix, what the fuck

last of the Phoenix POV chapters for now. This took so long to post because I’d been fighting with revisions to Ch 6 as well, but maybe we can get this rolling again now!

[Beginning] [Chapter Masterlist]

He tracked down Valant the night before the trial, after Apollo worriedly mentioned his reaction to the mystery envelope. The kid has decent instincts, even though Valant isn’t dangerous, not the way Magnifi was, not the way that Zak could be, only in the way that any witch could be dangerous, and particularly the way of certain witches Phoenix has known -- dangerous mostly to themselves. A fool in over his head, for purpose, for love, for power -- it’s an old story. So often the stories just repeat themselves.

“And that is it, then,” Valant says, staring up at the looming shadow of the coliseum in the darkness, where Phoenix found him prowling around its edges, searching for something that he never had a chance of finding. “My last chance, gone; Fate, toying with me, taunting me, and my life, lived in thrall to the dead.”

A witch’s power might fade with the death of a fae patron, and the chains might no longer be visible -- but something remains. Something always remains.

“I know how that feels,” Phoenix says. Valant turns his eyes over Phoenix, black glinting blue, and in nearly the same moment that the color changes, he recoils in horror, gripping his staff as though about to strike.

“You do not jest, Mr Attorney.”

Its relevance undeniable after the first day of Vera’s trial, Phoenix tells Apollo the most condensed summary as he can about the trial of Zak Gramarye and all of the magic and enchantments swirling about it. He never had the chance to make any notes on his conversation with Valant the prior night, so that, too, he must cut down to size -- Magnifi’s suicide, Zak’s false confession to clear Valant’s name, Valant’s own guilt for tampering with the scene of the suicide. What is in the envelope he leaves for another day -- it’s more a distraction than relevant to the case, and Trucy will have her chance soon to chase down the remainder of the Gramarye magic and undoubtedly drag Apollo along for the search. When they finish talking, he leaves Apollo with the court transcript and video of that last case to review again and the notes he made speaking with Valant and the Mishams during the course of his investigation seven years ago. There is more, there is still so much more -- he has not mentioned all of the curses marking each one of them, or Maya, and certainly not the picture that Zak gave him the last night of his life, showing Thalassa and her heirloom bracelets.

He had thought that Apollo’s aura seemed familiar, the first time he saw him at Kristoph’s office, and the reason for that is one of the truths that he does not yet intend to hand out.

Thalassa needs to know first.

(When Valant, murmuring to himself, said that they never saw a body, that she may still walk this earth -- Phoenix did not tell him what he already knew.)

There are several things that Thalassa needs to know, first.

Giving Apollo the transcript feels risky -- at the end of it he might decide that Klavier is the more trustworthy one. The prosecutor seems to have him charmed, magically or not (probably not), and Phoenix knows he hasn’t made a good impression on anyone since Mia. (No, not even Mia, but perhaps Ema.) And he certainly didn’t do a good job of defending himself in that trial -- Klavier was prepared (too prepared) and Phoenix too dazed and dazzled by enchantments and confused by who and how to know how to put up a fight.

He would have just told Apollo that Klavier was unusually prepared, beyond what a supposedly simple anonymous tip should have been able to get him, but he thinks that might just turn Apollo against him further, make him seem more to be playing Apollo against Klavier. He knows he can seem manipulative -- he knows he can be manipulative -- and this can’t be one of those times. Too much is at stake for Apollo not to believe him -- he needs Apollo to reach on his own the conclusion that Klavier knew too much. And if he accepts that, then he might be willing to accept what Phoenix knows about Kristoph and hasn’t yet divulged.

There’s just two last things he has to check before he can lay on Apollo the final answer of who killed the Mishams?

(No -- Vera isn’t dead, not yet. No one can lay down death so quickly like the royal women of Kurain.)

“I’ve a question for you, if I may, Valant,” Phoenix says. Valant is still staring at him, eyes bright in the dark, somewhere between suspicion and fear. “Zak’s Sight -- he was already losing it when I met him. It was part of his contract with Magnifi, and ended with his death.”

Valant nods, slowly, his blue eyes narrowing now, more suspicion than anything else. “Yet you, after all this time, can still See,” Phoenix continues.

“There is no question in your words, Mr Attorney,” Valant says.

“I think you can understand the question implicit,” Phoenix replies. Valant’s choice of a point of contention is a clear signal that this is not something he wants to discuss, but if Phoenix knew how to take a hint, he probably wouldn’t have ever become a lawyer in the first place.

“And I should imagine that a man so adjacent to the Fair Folk as yourself should understand the value of exact words.”

Fae-adjacent. That’s one way to describe it -- one way to point out that Phoenix should know to be careful in speech, not because he was a lawyer, but because of how he has tangled with magic. Not because of the path in life he chose, the purpose he worked toward, but because of what he stumbled into, this life equally blessed and cursed. His life, shaped by others, in thrall to death and the dead.

“You decided after Magnifi you still wanted a window to the Twilight Realm?” Phoenix asks. If Mia’s death had freed him -- what would he have done?

Valant slowly shakes his head. “Do you think that I before Magnifi went, never once prior having stepped forth from the world of the mundane? You must know that, as Zak Gramarye was not his, Valant Gramarye is not by birth my name.”

Phoenix nods. This still has about a hundred directions it could take. “And what I once was called I can no longer say, for that I traded away for the Sight. And from Magnifi I sought both power and a new self.”

“Your name for the Sight?” Phoenix repeats. He knows of of names taken, like Magnifi’s stripped from him entirely upon his banishment or Godot’s claimed by Dahlia in her victory, or given, has heard folktales of dead names erased or names that are otherwise not true tossed away in a dangerous trick to screw the fae in a deal – but to give away one’s self, plainly, in trade, is only a few steps down from selling one’s soul. How long did Valant spend nameless, without self, drifting unacknowledged until he became Valant? And no wonder he has been so determined to reacquire power, to be Magnifi’s heir, to be someone of import, someone known, if he knew what it was to not be named. “That seems a steep price for something so small.”

“Small? Mr Attorney, to have eyes that can See is no small thing. How many with even magic in their blood cannot See – how many who can See do not know how to interpret their vision? You were a lawyer, were you not – knowledge and truth are power over the Fair Folk. What price did you pay for clarity of vision?”

“It was a gift,” Phoenix says. From Maya, after Mia’s death, so that in that sole regard they could stand on equal footing, so that Maya could have an ally rather than a student.

Valant winces. “My condolences,” he says, and it sounds like he really does mean it. “In the long run, it is a far greater cost paid by you than I. For you to be close enough to one of the Folk that they chose to award you with a gift…” He taps his staff against the ground. “Zak and dear Thalassa were Magnifi’s favorites, and see where it left them. See the yoke you wear about your neck.”

“Hey, Mr Wright, you don’t think you can give me an advance warning next time when you decide that I’m working a critically important case for the future of our legal system?”

“Good to see you too, Ema.”

She flicks a chocolate snack at his face and turns back to the table where the evidence is laid out. “This is everything that Vera had on her when she collapsed,” she says. “Rest of the case evidence is elsewhere, but Mr Edgeworth said this is what you wanted to see.”

Phoenix nods. There is a pencil, its point worn down dull, the eraser flaking apart, and a sketchbook open to a page showing a wide sketch of the courtroom. She had given too much attention to shading in the columns behind the judge and the panels of the doors to have a promising career as a courtroom sketch artist, and while the drawing otherwise looks finished -- there, the judge’s shiny head, and there, Trucy with the wisp at her shoulder that is never hidden to the eye of a fae -- but the place where Klavier should be is a furiously scribbled cloud, some of the lines pressed so deeply into the page that the imprints must be visible on the next.

So she didn’t know what to make of what she saw. He files that fact away and turns his attention to what his real concern is, the glittering crystalline bottle of nail polish.

“From what the arresting officers said,” Ema says, “she wouldn’t be dragged out of the house without having those with her, just wailing and screaming -- said she couldn’t go outside without her good luck charm. Don’t know if that’s the sketchbook or the nail polish.”

“The polish,” Phoenix answers, automatically, ignoring Ema’s darkening expression at the fact that he is so immediately sure of such. “Have you--”

“Detective Skye, you were to wait for accompaniment before you allowed him in to look at the evidence. Wright. We talked about this.”

“Gumshoe and Faraday weren’t around, you weren’t here yet, and I trust him more than I trust anyone else around here,” Ema says. She doesn’t throw snacks at him, but munches forcefully.

“You really shouldn’t be eating in the evidence room,” Edgeworth says. “Both for the chance that you might contaminate the evidence, and because some of that evidence is poisoned.”

“Death comes for us all,” Ema says dryly. “Let me have my fucking Snackoos.”

Edgeworth furrows his brow and turns his glare on Phoenix, like he expects Phoenix to know how to deal with her, like they’re fellow members of the Bitter Cynics With Trust Issues Club -- which, well, they are, her of the mundane chapter and him of the magical. “This is all because I’m not trusted to not tamper with evidence?” Phoenix asks, knowing perfectly well that is the answer, because no matter how many strings Edgeworth has pulled to get him into this position on the committee, no matter how he and Franziska and every other connection Edgeworth has have fought for this chance, the reputation of the last seven years has all but obliterated the reputation he gained as the defense attorney who stood up to von Karma and Gant.

(And his association with Mia hasn’t helped, since it was revealed what she was, just two months before he was disbarred. Forger is one insult; witch is a name of a different sort, an even higher hurdle to jump, a description of him that almost isn’t wrong.)

“Yes; and building on that, there’s been concern -- not from me, mind -- that Detective Skye is a bit too friendly toward you.”

“Who’s saying I’m friendly?” Ema asks. “How have I gotten that reputation?” She scowls when Phoenix laughs. “Was it the glimmerous fop who was concerned? Mr Wright hasn’t touched anything, if you’re worried.”

“It doesn’t matter who it was,” Edgeworth says, which is not a no and thus makes this a matter that Ema will probably not drop so easily, even though Phoenix agrees with his sentiment. It could be anyone. It probably was Klavier. It doesn’t matter. They have bigger concerns. “I said that I wasn’t worried, Detective.”

“Ema,” Phoenix says, forestalling what he expects to be a continuation of the argument, “have you touched any of that evidence without gloves?”

She shakes her head. “Of course I haven’t. I do know what protocol is.” Edgeworth snorts. “Plus, you said to check it for poison. I’m not stupid. It’s atroquinine, specifically -- we just let the hospital know, because apparently they hadn’t figured it out--”

Phoenix gestures at the bottle of nail polish. “It would be easier to determine from that. Poisons don’t always react the same way in the fae.”

Ema freezes with a chocolate halfway to her mouth. She slowly lowers it back into the bag. “Ms Misham was one of the Fair Folk?” she asks. Phoenix nods. “That’s, uh -- shit. Why didn’t we know that one?”

“Prosecutor Gavin didn’t tell you?” He has heard -- from Ema, from Edgeworth, from Trucy, from Apollo -- that the working relationship between detective and prosecutor is a rocky one, but still, that is information that would be useful for her to know, that they might think could help determine a motive. That is information that, if not widely disseminated, should at least be passed to someone else on the investigative team, to have up their sleeve if the defense made it relevant -- or didn’t know. And Gavin is thorough -- it’s a surprise that he would have kept that one close to his chest.

Unless he was willing to sacrifice part of his case to avoid the question that inevitably is coming.

“How would he know?” Ema demands.

“So he didn’t tell you.”

“Wright,” Edgeworth says, voice low and dangerous, a growl but not a hiss. “How would he know?”

“I may have left out some facts about the Gavin brothers from everything I’ve said about them the last seven years,” Phoenix says. “The short of it is that Klavier has the Sight.”

“Wright…” The snarl is already gone from his voice; Edgeworth’s sigh is one of empty resignation, now. He knows Phoenix better than any other human, and he knows it is Phoenix’s nature to not show his cards until the last possible second. It pisses Edgeworth off, Phoenix knows it, but he prefers a frustrated Edgeworth to a worrying one, and his response to Phoenix telling him about Dahlia’s curse was enough for Phoenix to decide not to burden him with more. He hates to worry him.

And Apollo -- Phoenix doesn’t want to scare him. He doesn’t know what Apollo has been told by Klavier, but if he didn’t even point out to the detectives that the defendant is a fae for fear of questioning -- Apollo probably doesn’t know much more than that he can See. Not why, not anything about Kristoph -- and Phoenix needs Apollo to stare the two of them down, and he doesn’t know how much the boy would balk were he warned in advance. He’s not as stupid as Phoenix was.

“He’s human?” Ema asks. It sounds like a question not meant to be answered, and she follows it up a moment later with, “I thought so, because that fucking accent absolutely, unequivocally, counts as a lie.”

Edgeworth fails to stifle a laugh, but he blanches when he looks back at Phoenix and sees his eyes. “What are you looking for?” he asks. Ema’s attention turns immediately to Phoenix as well.

“Confirmation of my suspicions,” Phoenix answers, gesturing for them both to step back from the evidence table. If being in the vicinity of it is enough, it’s already too late, but he doesn’t see death marked on Ema the way it was on Vera.

The bottle looks different through eyes that aren’t human. (Vera should have seen this, Vera should have known, how could she have known, how many changelings don’t know what they are.) The crystal edges still catch the light, but inside the liquid looks like thick red mold, something rotten, curdling inside and straining to get out like it is something alive, an amorphous beast all its own. Phoenix glances about and crosses the room to the box of rubber gloves on the far shelf, snapping two onto his hands as he returns to the bottle. He unscrews the cap and pulls the brush forth, not so far that any of the polish will drip, but enough that there could be flow of air from the bottle to the outside.

The leaking wisps of something like smoke that he expects to see don’t come.

Huh. Strange. He didn’t think he’d win this time when he called its bluff -- unless --

“Wright, what the hell are you doing?”

Phoenix tosses each of the gloves in turn toward the waste bin and misses both shots. “I know it’s cursed, but I can’t figure out how to activate it.”

“Most people don’t want to activate cursed objects, Mr Wright,” Ema says.

“I’m already cursed,” he says. “There’s not much this particular thing can do to me.”

Phoenix picks up the bottle and Edgeworth inhales sharply. There’s a wild look to his eyes, one of fear, the one that Phoenix has been trying to avoid all of these years. “Your fingerprints on that bottle certainly will be able to do something to you,” he says stiffly, a valiant but futile attempt at masking what it is about this that truly concerns him.

“I should hope that any fingerprints were collected and analyzed already,” Phoenix says. The bottle doesn’t tremble in his hand or feel anything like the excess of energy that should be contained within it. He closes his fingers around it, finding himself reaching for something that isn’t there, and draws the brush from the bottle, wiping off the excess on the edges and squinting at it. The curse doesn’t look or feel any stronger now. The temptation to touch the polish on his skin is nearly overwhelming. “I don’t think I can activate it,” he says. “Not without licking it, and--”

Edgeworth has his wrist in a vicelike grip before Phoenix can finish his sentence. “--and that still won’t give us an accurate reading on the situation,” he continues, turning a glare on Edgeworth, whose expression doesn’t change, and he doesn’t release Phoenix’s wrist. “Because I’ll be poisoned.”

“So we wouldn’t know if it’s poison or the curse affecting you, and it won’t affect you, a human, the way it did Vera,” Ema adds. “There’s too many variables to make it a good experiment.”

“Also, the fact that he would be poisoned,” Edgeworth says.

“Hey, it takes about half an hour to kick in, right?” Phoenix asks. “There should be enough time for me to put together some data points.”

Edgeworth makes a strangled sound from the back of his throat. “I do have a question about that,” Ema says. “What’s the point of poisoning and cursing the bottle? I mean, if we’re trying to go about assessing this scientifically, why not just one or the other? Is the redundancy necessary?”

“Yes, and no,” Phoenix says. He tries and fails to elbow Edgeworth away, but Ema, having abandoned her Snackoos to grab gloves, plucks the bottle up from his hand and sets it back down on the table. It takes several seconds for Edgeworth to finally let him go. “There’s a couple different possibilities for why one would -- or wouldn’t do that.”

“We’re gonna be here for a while, aren’t we?” Ema grumbles, but she still looks intrigued, her eyes fixed on Phoenix and slowing to take her gloves off like she’s forgotten that she meant to be doing that.

“You wanted the scientific assessment.” Phoenix finds a wall to lean against. “Poison is the option to leave less of a trail -- I know that sounds odd, with forensics, but if you clean that up well enough” -- he gestures at the bottle -- “like so, then you’re clear. Magic always leaves an impression -- curses are especially distinct. Someone who has the Sight will be able to recognize what curses have come from the same person, and maybe even match that imprint up with the person themselves. So a killer who knows there’s others with the Sight tangled up in her webs is going to poison her victim so as to not leave that obvious beacon to follow.”

“Her?” Ema asks. “You don’t mean Vera?”

She is frowning, her lips pressed together in concentration, but Edgeworth just looks sad. “No, I don’t -- Ms Misham hasn’t poisoned anyone,” Phoenix says. “I was thinking of… someone else.”

He keeps being surprised to have Zak’s locket there when he touches his neck, but even when he isn’t wearing it, he can still feel a cold chain shifting against his skin. “Curses,” he says, clearing his throat, and it doesn’t help, he can still feel the sharp scrape of glass and metal down his throat, and then something less solid but even more suffocating cinching tight around his neck and lungs and heart, “are for if you want to baffle the humans investigating your case, and you’re sure that no one with the Sight is going to be looking at the corpse.” He can’t make himself take any breaths deeper than short gasps. “Or if you need someone dead in a hurry. If you don’t care that you’ll be Seen. Just as long as you can shut them up before they can say more.”

He’s a dead man, living on time borrowed -- no, stolen -- from someone else.

Ema pretends she doesn’t hear his discomfort, that she doesn’t see Edgeworth touch a hand to his arm for the briefest of moments. “So wait,” she says, “how is she even alive after all of this, the curse and the poison -- and still, why? That’s just asking to be caught both ways. More stupid than thorough.”

“You’re right,” Phoenix says. “It is odd, but speaking logically, it tells me a few things.” The crease between Edgeworth’s eyes deepens. “Hey, I know how to think logically, too!”

“Did I say you didn’t?”

“It tells me that the killer knew she was a changeling — he couldn’t count on solely the atroquinine to kill her, like he could for Drew.”

“Wait,” Edgeworth interrupts. “Do we know for sure that Mr Misham wasn’t cursed?”

Phoenix slaps the magatama into his palm. “I suspect he wasn’t, but also suspect I might not be allowed into the morgue, and have somewhere to be after this anyway--”

Edgeworth keeps glaring at him. “So no, I can’t say for certain yet that the stamp wasn’t cursed, or Drew directly,” Phoenix continues, “but I can be pretty sure, because he was only human, and thus likely to fall to atroquinine. Vera, on the other hand -- there’s no way to predict what toxins will do to the fae -- even iron and metals, it all depends -- and the killer couldn’t use atroquinine alone and be sure she would die.”

“But why not just the curse?” Ema repeats.

Because he didn’t think he was strong enough,” Phoenix answers. “He didn’t think his magic was enough to kill her, even with a curse of death. So then,” he continues, catching himself rapping his knuckles against empty air like he would were he holding a paper in front of him, “the catalyst would be the same thing. Vera chews her nails when she is anxious -- she gets anxious when she goes outside. She is called on to testify about who the client is, she’s on the witness stand, gets nervous, chews her nails -- the nail polish is cursed and poisoned. Together, maybe that’s enough.”

Maybe tomorrow, or tonight, but for now Vera still clings to life, and -- god, Phoenix hopes it isn’t enough. Guilt has chewed him apart enough over curses and death -- he should have known that mysterious “good luck charm” would haunt them, he should have found some way to force her to show it to him, how could he have known he should have known -- and please not Vera’s life on his conscience too.

“Then what’s death do if a person can walk around living with it?” Ema asks.

Edgeworth looks at Phoenix. Phoenix looks anywhere but at Ema. The strongest curse is cleanest: a swift end to one sole person. The power behind her curse would have been the most kindness Dahlia did for him -- but a weakened curse? Death, not like a gunshot but a dull, serrated blade, messy and painful and lingering, and Phoenix wishes that were an accurate analogy. He wishes that death marked on his chest left him the only one hurting, the only one dying. No, he lives, and that, life, was Mia’s gift. Life, for him, breathing room between his throat and Dahlia’s noose; life, for him, and everything around him dies.

He can’t force himself to look back at Edgeworth either.

“If he hadn’t been poisoned, Drew Misham likely wouldn’t have lived to be old,” Phoenix says, and Ema is silent, and he thinks that means she understands.

Or maybe he always would have been poisoned, no matter how long the stamp was saved, maybe he was just doomed in that way. Maybe there was never an if he hadn’t been poisoned; maybe there is only the curse, reshaping reality, and to parse any other circumstances out from it is a hopeless case, a circular argument, and he is the serpent eating his own tail as he in vain tries to understand what could have been otherwise. There is no otherwise.

Edgeworth hasn’t pressed the magatama back into Phoenix’s hands but has been giving it a wary look for the duration of the time he has been speaking. Slowly he holds it up to one eye, to examine the nail polish bottle. He can’t hide the disgust and horror, in equal measure, that crosses his face.

“One last thing,” Phoenix says. Ema has retrieved her snack bag and tosses a chocolate at him. He catches it, seriously considers it for a moment, and decides that even if there probably aren’t any traces of poison on his hands, and that probably he could survive atroquinine poisoning, it’s not worth it. He misses the trash can again. “I know you don’t deal with curses around here, but do you have some way of recording what’s up with that bottle -- to on-the-record get that information to Prosecutor Gavin, without him having to come down here to take a look.”

“The glimmerous fop can drag himself over here,” Ema grumbles. She seems to be throwing more chocolates at Phoenix than she is eating. “Especially if he has the Sight. Especially since that means he should be able to see who did it. Why should I bother filling out something for him?”

Klavier already knows who the murderer is. Klavier has known for a while -- of that, Phoenix is certain. Whatever fight he has put up, whatever fight he will put up tomorrow, the way that the curse swallowed up Vera was unmistakable, and that is far from the only clue. He will hardly need to come down here to look at the nail polish again to confirm the facts, and it might be safer if he were to stay away from it.

But Apollo and Trucy must have been in close proximity to it as well, waiting with their client in the lobby, and they were as fine as ever.

“If he does want to see it, don’t let him touch it,” Phoenix says. “Gloves or no. Even if Edgeworth is going to have to straighten out your salary or employment at the end of it, don’t let him touch it.”

“But you touched it,” Ema points out, aggressively crunching down on another Snackoo. “And I did. Unless” -- her eyes narrow -- “you’re worried about him being able to tamper with the -- the curses?”

“That’s not the part I’m worried about with him and curses,” Phoenix says.

“Fine, keep your secrets.” Ema throws another chocolate at him. “If he fires me, I’m hitting you up to pay my bills.”

“Me? When we have Edgeworth right here?”

“I’m not paying your rent, Wright.”

Phoenix laughs. Edgeworth’s stony expression does not change. “For once,” he adds, “you could stand to tell me things as you learn them.”

“I’m sorry,” Phoenix lies, because he’d drag this hell out another seven years if he had to, damn himself for all eternity in a second if the alternative had the merest chance of putting Edgeworth in reach of Kristoph’s claws. His is one life Phoenix cannot gamble.

He can’t live with that again.

“There’s one thing I have left to do, and then I’ll be able to tell Apollo, with certainty, everything he needs to know to start tomorrow’s trial.” And the rest won’t take long to follow. “Is Trucy still at your office, or did she go back to the agency?”

“I dropped her off at your office on my way here,” Edgeworth says. “Am I to suppose you’re keeping secrets from her, and that’s the reason you sent her off to me?”

She handed him the diary page that ruined his life; either her father or her uncle shot and killed her mother; Kristoph killed her father six months ago, when he reappeared sure that enough time had passed to make one same return and then a clean break forever. She’ll have to find out the last of those at some point, likely soon, too soon, soon enough that he should just tell her -- but the rest? On that, he swore Apollo to silence.

Edgeworth knows him too well. “Yes. I’ve already told Apollo everything I didn’t want her hearing.”

They make for the door, to leave Ema behind, but she stops them with a word. “Hey. Mr Wright.”

The door closes on Edgeworth’s shoulder, keeping it propped open for Phoenix. “Can you tell how someone acquired the Sight?” she asks. “Like, can you see it? Do you know?”

“Is this about Klavier?” he asks.

“If he did something really fucked up for it, like selling his soul, you’d tell us, right?”

“Ema, I picked him to be the prosecutor for this case. Do you really think I’d do that if I didn’t think he had integrity?”

She snorts. “Him, integrity, that’s – hah. You’re still not answering the question, anyway.”

Edgeworth raises an eyebrow and inclines his head at Ema, like he agrees that yes, Phoenix did dodge that question. “No, I wouldn’t tell you, but I wouldn’t have picked him for this, either,” Phoenix says.

Ema gives him that doubtful look again. “Mr Wright,” she says, “you didn’t answer my first question, either. If there’s a way you can tell.”

The answer, like most things with Phoenix and magic, is situational, dependent on a hundred other factors. Witches are easy to tell. Klavier – after seven years, Phoenix finally has a guess at what Klavier is, but it’s still just a guess.

“Because I’m not entirely stupid about magic things,” Ema adds. She tried to quantify magic, assess it scientifically, when she could; Phoenix explained to her about his eyes, a decade ago, and she directed him to sit on the floor and grabbed a magnifying glass and stared at his eyes like somewhere in there something had shifted that even she could see. That passion burned itself out. Phoenix knows how that feels. “I know there’s something fucked-up about the glimmerous fop.”

“I’m inclined to be suspicious about anyone who has the Sight,” Edgeworth says. Phoenix claps a hand over his chest and feigns offense; Edgeworth ignores him. “There’s no good way of acquiring it; and even if I were to trust the person, I will not feel the same about the circumstances that got them that…gift” – his mouth twists. Phoenix has used that word to describe the Sight and other blessings, too, but he has never felt it to be quite right – “nor the reasons they might have felt it was necessary to have. No one will simply think that it might help them in investigative procedures.”

Ema’s face falls. The snack bag crumples noisily in her hands and she tosses it to the trash. “My sister thought about doing that,” she says quietly, so softly that Phoenix barely hears her, and Edgeworth steps closer. “But that – that wasn’t just, simply. Didn’t wake up one day and figure cutting a deal for the Sight would just be a fun little thing. I keep remembering now, one of the times she brought the case home, and the whole team -- I remember sitting in the hall and listening to her and Jake argue, I think everyone else had gone home, and they were arguing, that yeah maybe the case doesn’t have anything to do with magic but if it does, she can’t just pass that up, she can’t just not follow that lead, even for…” She glances down at her hands, like she expects to find a new bag of Snackoos in them, like she doesn’t know what to do if she doesn’t have that nervous habit to lean on. “She said she’d sell her soul to convict Joe Darke, if she had to.”

“In a way, she did,” Phoenix says.

Ema nods. “In a way.”

Edgeworth closes his eyes and turns his head away.

In the way that people like him and Lana and Phoenix sell their souls, the mundane way, piece by piece, lie by lie, until there’s nothing left but that cold hollow where something human once resided.

“But that was why,” she adds, even softer, and Phoenix has to lean down further to hear, and Edgeworth doesn’t come closer this time, “I was going to -- to your… to Mia. Like sure she’s a defense attorney, but I thought, then, that -- that if it came to it, I would sell my soul to her for my sister back. For her soul back.”

She looks away. “And I found you, just a human.”

“Only human.” And too well aware of it, that even soulless, he is just human.

“But you still won it back for her.”

Phoenix doesn’t know what to say to that. Edgeworth is looking at him now, too. The volume of their conversation has slightly risen again; he probably heard the last sentence or two. “For whatever it’s worth, which is about nothing at this point,” Phoenix says, trying to deflect, trying not to think about how his own is the one soul he hasn’t managed to get back, realizing that Ema spoke so quietly because she wanted only Phoenix to hear and dropping his voice back down low, “I don’t think Mia would have taken you up on your deal.”

Ema is wringing her hands again, glances away and then stalks back toward the evidence. “So if the fop made a trade for the sake of his case, it had to be some fucked-up case.” Her suspicious glare settles again on the bottle of nail polish.

Edgeworth’s brow furrows. Doubtlessly he is thinking of a certain fucked-up case that Klavier was assigned to. Phoenix doesn’t know if he should dissuade that line of thinking, if Edgeworth assuming that Klavier thought that the Sight was necessary to take on Phoenix is a less charitable assumption than any other that he could make.

“And again, I do trust Klavier,” Phoenix says. Ema and Edgeworth’s arched eyebrows are almost mirrors of each other. “So trust my judgment, and the truth will come to light tomorrow.”

Somehow, impossibly, Ema’s eyebrow raises higher. She stood at the bench with Phoenix; she knows how his judgment can be. He decides that her semi-justified lack of total faith in him is close to warranted, and that he can deal with it another day. “See you around, Ema,” he says, taking the door from Edgeworth. Together they start down the hall.

“And where are you going now, Wright?”

“There’s someone I have to see. Maybe I can pry a motive out of him.”

The lock are black.

Phoenix has never seen them like that before.

#fic: the seelie of kurain #roddy fanfics #WOOHOO new chapter happy new year i've been fighting with this since the old year

17 notes · View notes

statsvitenskap · 5 years

Text

BONE!

my first Ace Attorney fanfic. i'm not all that good at writing fanfiction, since i'm normally the fanart type, but i saw this video by @edenleicester, and had to try it out(i changed the characters from their video a bit though. it's more or less the same). i copied most of the dialogue from this B99 clip.

link to ao3 version here.

reblogs > likes!

September XX, 20XX

XX:XX p.m.

Los Angeles Prosecutor’s Office

Klavier Gavin stood in the hallway of the Prosecutor’s Office. He and defense attorney, Apollo Justice, chatted while sipping from their drinks of choice. All was going well that day; Apollo had won his latest trial and Klavier had met another cute girl, much to Apollo’s dismay.

“Gavin,” he hissed, how do you know she's the one for you? She's probably just using you for your fame or something-”

“Nonsense, Herr Forehead!” Klavier smiled. “She's different from the others. I can tell… from her eyes.” The man's eyes went distant, as if seeing the girl in front of him then. Apollo rolled his eyes and looked away, only to choke on his water.

Phoenix Wright and Miles Edgeworth were walking into the Prosecutor’s Office, arguing like their lives depended on it. Having spotted the men first, Apollo quickly turned away, scared for his own life. Klavier, on the other hand, smirked, knowing the younger man was scared of Miles Edgeworth, or at the very least, the prosecutor's skills. He quickly grabbed Justice's shoulder and pulled him back to where he had been standing originally. “Herr Edgeworth, Herr Wright! Guten tag! How is the lovely couple today?”

Miles Edgeworth went the slightest shade of pink at the mention of him and Wright as a couple. The poor man still wasn't used to the fact that he was Phoenix Wright’s boyfriend. However, he quickly regained his composure.

“We would actually appreciate a bit of insight from you two,” Edgeworth replied. He glared at Phoenix. “Wright and I seem to be in a bit of a…” He paused. “...predicament.”

Phoenix scoffed. “More like a fight,” earning a glare from the man beside him.

Klavier's eyes widened. When he'd wanted to mess with Apollo, he hadn't wanted to mess with his boss's relationship in the process. Apollo was standing beside him, sweating nervously. Klavier glanced at him for help, earning only a glare. “I'm sorry, sir, but we wouldn't want to get involved in your personal life-”

Edgeworth rolled his eyes. “It isn't personal, it's a math problem.”

Apollo let out a series of frightened stutters while Klavier cringed. “Even worse.”

Phoenix sighed, using his free hand to massage his forehead in frustration. “Last night, Edgeworth and I had dinner together for the first time in two weeks, thanks to the cases that have been keeping us on our toes.”

“And someone thought it would be fun to spoil our date with an inane math problem,” Edgeworth interrupted, glaring at his spiky-haired partner. “to which his answer is wrong.”

“Enough foreplay, let's get to the numbers,” Apollo interrupted. Suddenly, when Klavier looked over at him, he had a notepad and pencil in hand.

“It's called the Monty Hall problem,” Edgeworth began. “Imagine you're on a game show. There are three doors, behind one of which is a car.”

Phoenix continues, “You pick a door. The host, who knows which door the car is behind, opens a different door, showing that there is nothing behind it. The host then asks if you'd like to choose another, unopened door. Should you do it?”

“No!” Edgeworth finishes.

“Yes!”

“It's simple math!” They both say at the same time.

“It doesn't make any sense to switch,” says Edgeworth. “The prize is now behind one of two doors, it's a 50/50 chance either way.”

“It's two thirds if you switch, one third if you don't. The probability locks in when you switch,” Phoenix retaliates. “We've been over this eight times!”

“Seven,” Edgeworth corrects him. “It's only been seven times. Now you can't even do simple addition.”

“Sorry, Mr. Edgeworth,” Apollo looks up from his calculations on his notepad. “but I think Mr. Wright is… well, right.”

Phoenix snickers at the pun, while Edgeworth glares at Apollo, causing the younger man to cower under the eyes of his superior. He quickly turns around, and walks out of the office. The other three men watch as he drives away.

“Wait… he was my ride!” Phoenix runs out of the office, yelling at the red sports car now far off in the distance.

Klavier grins. “That was a once-in-a-lifetime experience, wasn't it, Herr Forehead?”

Apollo rolls his eyes and walks away to get more water.

The next day, Apollo and Klavier stood in the lobby, once again chatting. Both men had more or less forgotten about the incident of the day before. Edgeworth walked into the office alone this time, prompting a greeting from Apollo. “Good morning, Mr. Edgeworth.”

“No, it's not.” Apollo and Klavier looked at the older man in confusion. “I haven't slept because of that idiotic math problem. Now I finally understand Wright's side.”

“Ah, I see!” Klavier grinned. “So it's all better and we never have to hear about math again?” Klavier seemed to have a hatred for math that Apollo didn't quite understand.

“Quite the opposite, actually. Now, I see more than ever how incorrect he is.” Edgeworth smirked, recalling the previous night's events. (“Do I have to teach you 8th grade statistics?” “Do I have to teach you 7th grade statistics?” “Do I have to teach you-”)

The two younger men traded expressions, while Edgeworth finished, “Now if you'll excuse me, I have to leave Wright a snide voicemail about teaching him kindergarten statistics.”

As Edgeworth walked away, Apollo and Klavier glanced at each other, confused. Finally Apollo shrugged. “Well, at least I didn't piss him off that time.”

“Honestly, those two just need to bone.” Klavier said to no one in particular.

“Gavin!” Apollo made a face. “That is your boss!” Klavier shrugged, smiled, and sipped at his water.

Edgeworth walked into the office the next day, only to find Apollo Justice under a table.

“Mr. Justice,” Edgeworth began, “may I ask why exactly you are… underneath a table?”

“I can't seem to find my bracelet, sir,” he replied.

Edgeworth cocked an eyebrow. “Have you seen where it went?”

“Actually,” Apollo came out from underneath the piece of furniture, holding a small diorama depicting three doors. “I think it's behind one of these doors. Why don't you pick one?” He asked, gesturing at the mini doors.

Edgeworth raked his hand through his hair in frustration. “Mr. Justice, I would rather not bring this Monty Hall problem from my personal life into my work life as well. At this rate, the Monty Hall problem will take over my life in little to no time at all!” Apollo flinched and grinned awkwardly, scratching his neck.

Behind Apollo, Klavier sighed. “The math isn't the problem sir. These cases are keeping you and Wright apart. You two just need to bone.”

Apollo let out a scared whimper, and Edgeworth gave Klavier a look that left Apollo sweating, even though the look was not directed at him. “What did you say?”

“Don't say it again,” Apollo whispered, loud enough for only Klavier to hear.

Klavier smirked. “I said,” he raised his voice just barely, “you two need to bone.” Apollo flinched, and the look from Edgeworth escalated to a dark glare.

“How dare you, Prosecutor Gavin-” Edgeworth's voice raised with every word he spoke- “I am your superior prosecutor!”

With that, the man launched into a frenzy of scolding. He paced the room, later walking over to the hallway gripping the edges, and yelling, “BONE!” each time, with increasing intensity.

Nearly ten minutes later, Apollo and Klavier stood face-to-face, Edgeworth scolding the two with a dark red blush.

“What happens in my bedroom, Prosecutor Gavin, is none of your business!”

Another ten minutes later, he began yelling “BONE!” even louder than before. All the while, Apollo whimpered and curled into himself on the couch. Klavier tried to comfort him by wrapping an arm around him, though he couldn't seem to wipe that smirk off his face.

In the end, after a long time of shouting, scolding, and wildly gesticulating at the doorway, Edgeworth finally left Klavier and Apollo, Apollo’s face down on the coffee table in front of him. “Don't ever speak to me like that again.” He finished and left.

After the Chief Prosecutor had left the lobby, Apollo looked up at Klavier, hands shaking. “Your boss is so scary…”

Klavier chuckled, one hand on the other man's back. “Don't worry. He's much nicer once you get to know him.”

“Why did you do that, anyways?” Apollo whispered, leaning against Klavier.

“Herr Edgeworth was pent up. Now he knows,” Klavier grinned. “Maybe he'll actually do something about it this time around.”

Apollo sighed and put his head in his hands.

“Good afternoon, Herr Edgeworth!” Klavier grinned at the Chief Prosecutor entering the office.

Apollo sipped his water. “You're unusually late, sir. By the way, I contacted a math professor about the Monty Hall problem-”

“No need.” Edgeworth held up a hand, almost shooing the younger man away.

“You solved the problem?”

“No.”

The younger men glanced at each other from across the room. Apollo began blushing a deep red when Klavier began to ask-

“So you two-”

“Yes,” Edgeworth replied quickly and began his trek up the stairs.

Klavier grinned at the other man from across the room. A silence overcame the room until-

“Our bosses had se-”

“Shut up!”

#ace attorney #narumitsu #wrightworth #klapollo #fanfic #aa fanfic #ace attorney fanfiction #phoenix wright #miles edgeworth #klavier gavin #apollo justice

4 notes · View notes

janglyjusticeforall · 6 years

Text

Begin Again

Summary: Several snapshots following two men cracked by the harsh reality of life and trying to piece each other back together again.

Read it on AO3

Characters: Klavier Gavin, Diego Armando/Godot, Ema Skye, Phoenix Wright I Mentioned: Kristoph Gavin, Mia Fey, Misty Fey/Elise Deauxnim, Winston Payne, Daryan Crescend, Simon Blackquill

Ships: N/A

Word Count: 2,725

Author’s Note: I actually wrote this for a good friend of mine who hasn’t quite finished Apollo Justice yet, so I can’t really give it to him. Instead, I’ll share it with you guys! I really hope that one day Godot will return to the series; he deserves it. Enjoy!

The first time they meet is two weeks after Klavier’s first trial. He’s proud of his win and even more so proud of exposing a long-standing attorney who’s built his entire career on lies.

“You look lost, kid,” a voice says. Klavier hates to admit that he is. Chief Prosecutor Payne had issued him to go to the district’s only high security prison and speak with an inmate who may have intel the prosecutor needs for an upcoming trial. The task itself isn’t exactly in Klavier’s job description, but something tells him that this is more than just your standard interview. This is a test Payne’s providing to see if Klavier is all the record’s chalked him up to be. Klavier has every intention on passing it.

Of course, nothing had prepared him for how utterly useless the guards are. Sure, the outside of the prison is high security and solitary confinement is on an absolute lockdown, but every other section of the prison is mazes of cells and little population watching the outsides of them.

Klavier thinks he might have had to turn left 13 paces back instead of right. No matter- he could always turn around.

Instead, he looks to the barred inmate speaking to him. “I don’t suppose you have a map,” he counters.

The man… isn’t what he was expecting. Regardless of personal prejudices, he thought criminals had to meet a certain caliber. He thought once their true selves were exposed, once they were locked up and justice was served, they’d revert into orange-clad monkeys who spit at you and call you names.

The man in front of Klavier did not look like someone who would spit at him and call him names. The man in front of Klavier was wearing a designer suit and drinking out of a mug that said ‘#1 Inmate’ with a handcuff decal. Instead of baggy eyes or thick-rimmed glasses, this man dons a metal visor that glows a deep red in contrast to the green tinge of the prison lights.

Alright then.

The man sets down his mug and leans back against the metal frame of his cell’s bunk-bed. “‘S the problem with lawyers like you nowadays,” he broods. “You take the first mug you see as coffee and never once question whether it may be just an extremely dark cup of tea.”

Klavier narrows his eyes. He decides this man is trying to fight him. That’s the problem with Klavier at age 17. He never could back down from any challenge or fight. He never could let anyone try to change his mind. He never could admit that his perspective is not absolute.

He’d yet to be proven wrong. Give it time.

“Who even are you?” Klavier snaps. The man seems to have to consider this for a moment before finally coming to a decision.

“Godot.”

Klavier presses, “Is that a last name or a first name?” The man doesn’t respond- just takes another sip of coffee. “Whatever,” the teenager grumbles. He doesn’t have time for this. As he stalks away, he can feel eyes from behind the visor trained on him until he turns the corner again.

It wasn’t a test. Chief Prosecutor Payne just didn’t feel like taking the time to interrogate his own witness.

He gives Klavier the rest of the day off, though, as compensation for his efforts. Klavier takes the time to just-so-happen-to stumble into the court’s archives. And if he winds up in the ‘G’ section, well, that was a stumble as well.

There are four cases in Godot’s folder- three of which he was a prosecutor for, and the final he was the defendant in. Despite the information for that one being completely blocked out and marked as ‘confidential’, Klavier can imagine what the verdict was. Another one of his files- the last dated prosecuting one- is completely classified as well; however, the first two of his trials are free for Klavier to read.

They’re both against the same defence attorney. Phoenix Wright- the name makes Klavier scowl. He decides then and there to put the files back and push this to the back of his mind. He had no intention in getting involved with another one of the cheat’s schemes.

The second time they meet is after Kristoph’s first conviction. Truthfully, Klavier knows where solitary confinement is, yet he finds himself making a left where he should have turned right and is face to face with the ex-prosecutor Godot yet again.

There’s no particular reason, Klavier thinks. He mostly just wants to see if the man is still alive.

Godot now has a bunkmate. The man has thick black hair, broad shoulders, and an intimidating presence. He sits in the back of the cell, legs crossed, eyes closed, completely devoid of any movement aside from his own steady breathing.

“Meditation,” Godot informs Klavier. “He can sit like that for hours and nothing disturbs him. It’s almost fascinating.”

Klavier doesn’t say anything.

Godot continues, “You aren’t dressed like a guard. You’re dressed like you might actually make some money.”

“You don’t remember me?” Klavier asks, sounding surprised. Godot laughs in response, but it sounds bitter.

“There are other things I prefer spending my time mulling than a bratty kid.”

Klavier opts against responding again. Instead, he takes the time to look into Godot’s cell and deeper at his life. It’s small. If Klavier took a step to the right, he could probably see the toilet against the wall, but he doesn’t. He looks back at Godot again. “I’m sorry,” he says.

Godot scrunches up his nose. “Maybe, but not for me. If you were sorry for me, you would have come back earlier.”

Klavier nods because that’s fair. There’s a lapse in conversation before he decides to admit some truth.

“I looked up your records. I couldn’t find anything from before you started prosecuting. Not even your résumé or where you studied law.”

Godot shrugs, taking a sip out of his #1 Inmate mug. “The person whose body this once was died a long time ago. I am just a prisoner to the mistakes he made.”

It doesn’t really make any sense, but in that moment, Klavier felt like he understood.

Klavier starts visiting him every Saturday. It’d be unprofessional for him to abuse the benefits of being a prosecutor to visit Godot’s cell, so he sits along a row of cubicles, each with their own special phone, surrounded by other people who share business with convicts trapped within these walls.

Godot actually made Klavier laugh the first time he’d come there. “I almost rejected your invitation to meet,” the white-haired man admits, sliding his mug between his palms, “because I had no idea what the fuck your name is.”

On Klavier’s way out of his and Godot’s first visit, the guard by the door remarked, “That’s the first time I’ve seen him accept an invitation since he was admitted seven years ago.” In that moment, this one time fluke became a regular, weekly thing.

Randomly, some weeks later, Klavier tells him, “You could get out of here,” leaning closer to the glass and gripping the table. “Become a prosecutor again. I’m sure you could do it. Get off on good behaviour or something. Even if it’s not in your sentence, strings can be pulled.”

Godot’s nose scrunches up, dark hand reaching up to scratch his chin. “You know, kid,” he says, leaning back in the rickety metal chair the government oh-so-generously provided. “I just don’t think prosecuting is in my blood.”

“Then why’d you do it,” Klavier arches an eyebrow, knuckles turning white. “It’s not exactly an easy job to obtain.” Godot ignores the younger’s obvious frustration in favour of looking out the barred window of the visitation area.

After a long pause, he replies, “There was someone I needed to find. Someone I needed to stand on equal ground with. Actually, no, that’s a lie,” he looks back at Klavier, the corners of his mouth twitching upwards. “I needed to find him and always be five steps ahead of him.”

“Did you?” the blond asks. Godot laughs.

“No,” he sighs. “I never did.”

The first time Klavier ran into Phoenix in the seven years since he’d exposed him was in the supermarket at 3:42 in the morning. Earlier that day (or, he supposes, it was technically yesterday), Klavier lost a case to the same defence attorney that sent his brother to solitary confinement. Apollo Justice was now working under the Wright Anything Agency. Go figure.

“Nice work in court today,” Phoenix remarks. From anyone else, Klavier thinks it may have come across as a taunt of sorts, but Phoenix seems to genuinely mean it.

Klavier could say thank you. He could ask Phoenix about what happened seven years ago. Hell, he could ask Phoenix what happened just a few months ago.

Instead, he asks Phoenix about Godot.

Klavier doesn’t miss the recognition that immediately flares up in Phoenix’s eyes. But then Phoenix still responds with, “Sorry, I don’t think I’ve had the opportunity to meet him.”

The experience makes Godot genuinely holler with laughter. “Trite really said that?” he exclaimed, clapping his hands. The whole predicament has Klavier on edge. “That’s exactly the kind of thing I wouldn’t have expected him to say. He really has changed a lot since he was disbarred.” Godot takes a sip of coffee.

“Since before he was disbarred,” Klavier finds himself arguing. Even to himself it sounds rehearsed, though it’s never an argument he’s ever had aloud before. “He presented false evidence in court.”

“Yea, well that’s-” Godot stops abruptly, shakes his head, takes another sip of coffee. “I try not to call things impossible. But the Phoenix Wright I knew- the one from seven years ago- he respected his mentor. And for anyone who respected Mia Fey to do something like that, well,” a third sip, “that’s impossible.”

Klavier’s about to argue that Godot’s point was cute and all, but he wasn’t there like Klavier had been there, when he notices the absence in Godot’s voice. Klavier suddenly thinks they’re talking about more than just Phoenix Wright.

“When you get out of here,” Klavier asks, “what will you do?”

He receives a firm shake of the head in response. “I don’t plan on getting out of here,” Godot admits. Before Klavier can ask why, he continues, “There is nothing waiting for me outside of here. My story has already ended.”

Mia Fey’s body was buried in a graveyard outside a small village in the mountains. Klavier goes there late at night when he knows no one will spot him. To the right of her grave is a stone that reads ‘Misty Fey’ and to the left is the only one in the graveyard with a male’s name on it. It says ‘Diego Armando’. Somehow, it looks older than its companions.

According to the archives, Diego Armando drank up to 17 cups of coffee in nearly every trial.

Klavier’s trying not to let it show, but he’s getting sick of bullshit. Is everyone around him keeping secrets? First Kristoph, now Daryan. He swears next week Ema Skye is going to kill somebody, and he’s just going to have to quit his job.

“Please tell me you haven’t killed someone,” is the first thing that comes out of Klavier’s mouth. Godot’s eyebrows shoot up in surprise.

“Prepare to be disappointed,” he mumbles into the rim of his coffee mug. Klavier groans, head falling into his arms. It’s silent as Godot watches the prosecutor before him try to pull himself back together with ropes that his loved ones keep on wanting to cut. “Hey, kid,” Klavier lifts his head up. “The only time a lawyer can cry is when it’s all over. Your job is to keep smiling until the end.”

The blond nods, finally sitting up. Godot grins, not quite like he means it, but not at all in the grim way he usually does. It gives Klavier hope.

Months later, Krisoph is convicted.

Again.

Klavier smiles when he says it to Godot. The older man tiredly runs a hand through his hair, whistling lowly. “I think it’s fair to cry now, honestly,” he admits. Klavier shakes his head.

“I think I may be cursed. Or have really, really bad luck,” when Godot’s expression turns questioning, Klavier continues, “Herr Wright seems to think this is just the beginning. They’re calling it ‘The Dark Age of the Law’. I can’t help but think that I contributed to the start of it.”

Godot makes a face. “I can’t say I believe much in curses or luck,” he begins.

“But you do believe in spirit mediums?” Klavier finds himself asking before Godot can finish. Immediately the white-haired man goes rigged. Klavier regrets opening his stupid mouth.

“I believe that the world keeps turning,” Godot says carefully, “and that we turn with it.”

Klavier starts speaking again to apologise, but Godot cuts him off, saying he has to go. Klavier knows he has nowhere to go but still lets him use the excuse. For the first time, they stop talking before visiting hours end.

Klavier thinks that, to him, Godot is what Phoenix Wright was to Fräulein Skye however many years ago that was. And he understands now why Ema hated him so much for so long. He supposes that if he’d been in her situation, he’d have a lot of reasons to hate a lot of things as well.

Now he sits cheerfully on her desk awaiting her to return from her lunch break. And when she does, she looks significantly less ecstatic about coming to work today. Klavier could concede, however, that she doesn’t immediately attack him with her ever present arsenal of Snackoos now that Phoenix’s name has been cleared. Progress?

“Can I help you?” Ema even bothers to sound somewhat professional. Progress!

“I need a non work related favour,” he sheepishly admits. She tilts her head to the side, eyebrows furrowing in confusion. Klavier can’t help but think about how different her response would have been three months ago. “And regardless of whether you pull it off for me, I do have something else to give you.”

Ema gives Klavier a skeptical look, setting her bag down next to him on her desk. “Alright,” she decides. “I’ll hear you out.”

There is a rehabilitation program for prisoners. After all, once you’re convicted for eight or so years, it can be a bit difficult to get back up on your feet.

When Godot is released, the state has him join one of these programs. He’s to meet with his parole officer every week indefinitely. He also has a psychiatrist now, which is an interesting touch, but he supposes it couldn’t hurt. If he didn’t like it then he’d find a way out of it. He thinks it might do him so good, though, because even though the gaping hole in his heart no longer yearns for things he could never again have, it has filled with a certain emptiness that he doesn’t think will ever go away. But, yknow. Maybe it’s manageable.

He’s given a temporary living space until he sorts out where he wants to go from here. On his bedside table is a poorly disguised mug underneath gaudy purple wrapping paper and a note.

Herr Caffeine Addiction,

If you are ever truly found guilty again, do not expect anything like this to happen. There is no smorgasbord of second chances. Let’s not kill anyone else, ja? This is a thank you for everything you’ve done this past year.

Diego Armando may be dead, but Godot still has life left in him. Do not be prisoner to yourself. That is, for lack of a better word, stupid.

I’ve left you a gift to get you settled. Once you obtain a phone, give me a call.

Klavier Gavin

P.S. Recently, my detective has found the resources to return to school so that she can take her forensics test again. I’m sure you, too, could find the resources to replace said detective. If that’s something you’d be interested in, ja?

When he unwraps the present, he finds ‘#1 Partner’ staring up at him. Godot wonders, for the first time in this new life, if a story can really begin again.

10 notes · View notes

lairofsentinel · 7 years

Note

Looming truths 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 10 11 12 13 14 15

Loomingtruths - answers as long as the fic XD

1:What inspired you to write the fic this way?

The game,the chars, and my depression back then.

2:What scene did you first put down?

It's hardto remember. The first ones were with Lang. Another of the firstones was the scene in which Phoenix tells Miles to stop behaving likea child, that they looked like actors in a opera soap. It was meantto be a parody/criticism of my own ridiculous scene lol.

Anotherone was the first scene in which Phoenix is depressed, laying on bed,unable to get up, sitting a bit but then falling again on the bed, wanting toforget his life, struggling with his bisexuality.

Also the 2possible Endings: the one in which Miles died (that turned out to be a scenein middle of the fic), and the solution of the whole plot about thecase of faceless bodies. You can't write police-like texts without doing them backwards: solve the crime and then, start splitting theparts that form the crime and making them fade out into thecharacter's doubts, assumptions, and lack of info.

3:What's your favorite line of narration?

Milesmonologues in front of graves. He got all my existential shit there.XD

AlsoLang's.

“Kay.Once again, her image appearedon his mind, and like his father's, it gave him some kind of vaguesafety, that only those pastprotective figures could provide in the world of the living ones. Maybeafter all this time he had found a sense to that strange habit ofvisiting old stones. The uselessneed to talk with those who were gone. Those who would never, everreturn.

“Everycase I read, now more than ever,scares me by foreseeing the image of the most terrifying hellawaiting us. The madness that humanscan reach frightens me. There are no rules for what is waiting foryou when human creativity,the disrupted one, is challenged. There is not even a kind of naturalrewarding system afterlong periods of suffering. It's more of the same. Uncertainty, chaosand nonsense. It's all you have.So unpredictable. That's why my father lies here. And also, that'swhy I'm here, alive. This universeworks in such fearful, chaotic ways. If humans can't put order toit... an order that could givesome kind of consolation to those who are lost in this storm...what's the point of being humansand be proud of it? What's the point of Justice and Law?”

“What?!”Klavier opened his eyes wide for a second. That was the mostrevolting suspicion he hadreceived in years. He was angry, but also tired. Putting his hands onhis head, he shook it slightlyover the desk and his voice started to get louder. “I can't believethe kind of image you haveabout me... all of you. I've done everything by the book. Myprosecution skills were perfect afterthat unfortunate first case. I've tried my best to do everythingright since then. But people are moreconcerned about my leather pants than the amount of cases I'vesolved. Yes, I don't wear a damnsuit, or glasses, and I work on my tan. But I'm a fair man. I'm notmy brother! I don't care aboutthe Gavins' legal fame!. Stop thinking of me as if I were him! He isdead! I pushed forthat tohappen!” Klavier sighed, calming himself down while straighteningon his seat. “Don't you dareto treat me as the twisted man he was.

4:What's your favorite line of dialogue?

Thereare many. One that comes to my mind is the one with Lang and Kayabout idealism:

“Iknow, but at least this will stop it. So many deaths weren’t invain” [said Kay]

“Iwouldn’t be so sure... but I let it go”, defeated emotionsplastered in his voice, in his eyes, in his soul.

Curious,Kay raised an eyebrow and smiled as if what Lang had just said was amere joke. “are youserious?”

“Let'sbe honest. You can't be serious believing this willfix the world, don't you think?”

Kay'ssmile was wiped out of her face. “So, you are doing things withoutbelieving they would changeanything?.”

Heshrugged, “Hmph, who knows.”

“Well,you should. It’s you I’m asking. You. You should know, it's yourown fucking mind.”

Bothof them looked at each other, defying, aggressively provocative. Anold tired wolf fighting againstthe Master. A little crow too smart for a savage predating world. “Ihave no time for over-thinking those things so much, like certainpeople could. I need to watch thosecriminals and sink my fangs in their throats. That's all my father,my whole family, my ancestorshave been doing through the years. But when your so long-lastingheritage has been doingthe same you do, century after century, and things never change onebit, you start to doubt if whatyou are doing right now will be the same useless thing they have donebefore.”

“Youare a bit pessimistic, Wolfie...” her face darkened. “I want tobelieve my father's ideals will beaccomplished, some day. A world that doesn't need the Yatagarasu. Hedied for this... you can't beaccomplished, some day. A world that doesn't need the Yatagarasu. Hedied for this... you can't sayit was useless....”

“Ofcourse it was not completely useless.Some people could have been saved with all this. I'll giveyou that, but... let's be serious. “

“Ican't believe that”. Kay looked at a screen, but her eyes were notwatching any of the lines displayedon it. A cold silence tensed the atmosphere.

“Forwhat it's worth, believe what you want, crow girl.” Lang threw histired body on the bed and sighedagain. A glimpse of Tyrell's image crossed his mind, remembering howmuch the old man usedto complain about the youngsters' enthusiasm. Probably time hadgotten to Lang as well, too oldfor interacting with young people in the same way he used to

5:What part was hardest to write?

Apollo'ssubplot. All about Apollo was always hard to write for me.

6:What makes this fic special or different from all your other fics?

Thefandom. I usually write one fic in each fandom, and that's all what Ido. I put all my passion, all what I want and I like in that singlefic. That's why my fics are... ridiculously long. The topics maychange according to the fandom. In Ace Attorney I try to focus a loton topics such as Justice, Power, corruption of the powerful ones,the loneliness, depression, several existential shit, love hard todeal (I mean, romance in Looming Truths is more about romance thatsometimes cross toxic limits and the couple tries to come back to ahealthy way). It's far from pinky romance, I guess. And of course,sexuality in a non-smut way. I read all my life fics with such smutin them, that I'm unable to write better things than that, so I tryto show the others things that may happen in sexual situations that Ididn't read in fics often.

7:Where did the title come from?

It'sthe common thing of all chars: truths that are there, hard to find or to see, that lurk aroundthem, like looming threats. It also applies to the case of facelessbodies, the main plot of the fic.

8:Did any real people or events inspire any part of it?

Hohoho.Like... Sure. There is a mix between the characterization of the gamechars and how I relate them to some people I've met in my life. Tosay the least, Phoenix is unbelievably similar to one of my ex, theone I had a long relationship as wonderful as you can read in the ficwith a person so hard to deal with due to their lack of emotionalintelligence like me.

Allthe stress and the conflict that Phoenix lives related to hisbisexuality, realising that he is bisexual when he was almost thirty,the shock it gave him is basically all the struggle one of my exlived, and I was close her to see all the process and how her mindwas deeply conflicted to this.

Klavier'sweird emotions and doubts for his brother are basically thestrangeness I feel when I think of my relationship with my father.

Theconcept of “let it flow” with Miles' stress and lack ofunderstanding?, Franziska dealing with all the shit around men, abouthaving to be much better than all of them because otherwise she willbe not recognized at all? And all her walls of rudeness around hereven though she was destroyed about Andrew's death? Because beingseen as a woman in a masculine environment makes surviving hard toaccomplish?. That's all different sides of myself in my real life translated into AA situations.

MyAura? it’s basically the friend I dedicated this fic: noir. I wroteAura always thinking in her.

10:Why did you choose this pairing for this particular story?

Narumitsu:because I love the pair. It will sound lame but I had a relationship like this once, and I know this is the kind of relationship I want to have. Writing about this gave me a lot of nostalgia. They look such a healthy couple, despitetheir weakness and flaws and fears. Their brutal honesty is what makes themkeep going on.

Klapollo:Well, I was not planning to do this pair, but considering how Klavierwas portrayed, I wanted a bit of good things in his life, same forApollo, so I tried to do what I did: a toxic relationship trying totake away the toxic part.

Franziska/Andrew:I wanted to write a lesbian, and Francy has that type ofpersonality that usually is only portrayed on male chars, so that'swhy I tried to write as much as possible about her, andI wanted her lesbian as fuck. But, to be honest, Andrew and Franziskaare not a pair I like. I simply see them too toxic in the game,that's why I changed a bit Andrew's personality. I did not want toshow co-dependant relationships as “good” relationships, but Idid not want to show the only lesbian couple in the fic as anunhealthy one, so I played a bit far away from the “in-char”field there. Sadly, I dont have lesbian pairs in AA. :( it hurts me. I can’t ship Francy with anyone, because she needs someone like Phoenix: tender, but that also has enough personality to calm her down. Ema is too aggressive and bitter for that. Maya is too naive and too “out of Francy’s field” (I mean, Laws. They dont have common ground from where to build the cound), Andrew doesn’t have a personality that could make Francy behave. I see that a “no” from Andrew is always too weak for the storm that Francy is. Lang’s personality is really good for her, but again, I want her lesbian as fuck, sorry.

Lang-Miles:Not my pair, but my friend's (Noir). I wrote half of this fic due to her,because she wanted to read a fic about lang-miles relationship in-char without rape, and well...Looming truths turned out like this.

11:What do you like best about this fic?

Thecharacters interactions and their existential shits.

12:What do you like least about this fic?

It'sgrammar, the words I used, the way I wrote it. English not being mynative language makes some sentences hard to write. In Spanish I cancraft a really good fitting sentence, but then it goes clumsy inEnglish, with less intense emotion or simply weird. But well, thisfic was, in part, written as a way to force me learn English. And Itdid it in a marvellous way.

Stillyet, I resent a lot its grammar issues, and some weird descriptions.Sigh.

13:What music did you listen to, if any, to get in the mood for writingthis story? Or if you didn't listen to anything, what do you thinkreaders should listen to to accompany us while reading?

Myplaylist. It's immense. It's full of OST from videogames, classicalmusic such as Vivaldi or Mozart, Jrock, Jpop, electronic music, tango,electro-tango, enka, celtic music, Irish music. Uff. It's a looong list.

Theonly song I think readers should listen while reading is the one Ilinked in the Epilogue.

14:Is there anything you wanted readers to learn from reading this fic?

Alot of things. But I leave that up to the readers. Every readerlearns or takes from the text what they want/need in that moment.That's all what I expect from the writer-reader relationship.Also, I’m always too obsessed with people developing their own critical thinking. I always try to stimulate that on my fics, to make situations that force readers keep thinking, and taking positions. If that happens, that’s all I want from my readers. That, and comments helping me to improve my grammar XD but those never came.

15:What did you learn from writing this fic?

English,lol. A loooot.

AndIt helped me to overcome my deep depression in that moment. It helpedme to survive really bad times. Like I said to one of my ex once: ifI write, it means I'm really bad. If I'm feeling happy and ok, Idon't have wishes for writing. But when I feel myself eaten bydepression, I learnt that writing helped me to kill me, to hurt me, toforgive me, to guide myself. Writing is for me a healing process thatno therapy can match.

1 note · View note

wardencommanderrodimiss · 5 years

Text

Chapter five of the Fae AU has arrived! Shoutout to @runningwolf62 for giving it a beta read and assuring me it’s not incoherent.

[Beginning] [Chapter Masterlist]

“Wright.”

“If you have an objection, it’s ‘Chairman Wright’ to you, and you should’ve brought it up twenty minutes ago while the meeting was still on.”

“You’re insufferable.”

“I know. What’s up?”

“You aren’t really intending to seat a dead woman on your jury, are you?”

“I dug into it seven years ago. There was never any death certificate issued, so as far as the state, and this, is concerned, it’s fine.”

“You know that’s not what I’m referring to.”

Apollo cannot decide whether to tell – read: is stalling on telling – Klavier about the contents of his talk with Wright. The back half of August brings with it a few small cases: “Our luck is picking up!” Trucy announces brightly, just a few days before the school year begins again and leaves Apollo alone, rattling around the empty office like the cryptkeeper among the dead. Phoenix is gone, again, as ever, as always, and Apollo starts applying to nearby convenience store cashier jobs, figuring that he can’t actually keep this up much longer. He takes a few days at the end of September to do some research on the country of Khura’in, digging up anything he can find just to remind himself that it is a real place anchored in the mortal realm. It's hard to find much of anything, but he tracks down - written in Khura'inese, of course - an article from earlier in the year, detailing the beginning of the second phase of construction on the queen’s palace of iron, a prohibitively expensive venture when she demands every piece hand-wrought.

Yes, the people of Khura’in are as paranoid and superstitious as any; Apollo suspects there's good reason for that, given how close the name of that country is to the name Kurain Village, said to be where the Fae Court in California sits. It was just Dhurke who wasn’t.

Apollo pushes his laptop away, tries to forget, again, like he does every time when the goddamn cycle of the hazy memories of his childhood wraps back around to this stage; and he grabs his phone and texts Klavier.

I talked to Mr Wright about what you said

The reply is nearly instantaneous, and Apollo wonders how Klavier gets any work done -- and doubtlessly he has work -- if he jumps at every message anyone sends him.

-About the office or about him?

(Maybe he doesn’t actually have that many people sending him messages.)

Him

(Trucy says, from word of the obsessive online fandom and the tabloids, that the Gavinners technically haven’t broken up but there’s been nothing since a statement about Daryan, and the other three have only been sighted without Klavier.)

-Do I have to warn you again how unwise that question is?

(Klavier hasn’t been seen in public at all for a month.)

It worked out fine Especially since he is human

-One day it -What

He told me he’s human Was pretty clear stating so actually

Apollo stares at his phone for a minute and with no response, sets it aside and stares at the stack of files on his desk. He pulled copies of some of Phoenix’s old cases again to look back through -- maybe he can glean something about his history, what could have led him into so many curses -- but they don’t seem especially appealing now. He dug out the first case long enough to recognize the name of his co-counsel, Mia Fey, and that there seemed clear enough corroborating evidence to Phoenix’s statement: young and far too stupid to know better. And maybe he’s a witch, or maybe he’s some sorry soul who got trapped in a deal with no benefit to him, but if one of the fae taught him how to be a lawyer, it would certainly explain -- well, everything about him.

-Did you mention me or just tell him you yourself suspected?

That wasn’t the response Apollo expected after nearly ten minutes. He’d figured it would be something longer. Not less self-obsessed, though. That seems typical.

I didn’t mention you but he figured it out

He has a message typed out about the hellhound and deletes it. Phoenix and Klavier and Trucy can see things that other people can’t, and Apollo isn’t like them -- he should be like Clay, or Mr Eldoon, ignorant of it. He doesn’t want to know if it means something that he sees it, and he thinks Klavier would tell him.

No response. Apollo folds the corners of a sticky note until they tear. How does he miss Trucy’s daily annoyances this much? He goes out to the main room of the office and wonders if any of these props go to a magic trick that is simple enough for him to learn from the internet. He sends another message, one not related to demon hounds.

He said you have something called the sight, or whatever Is that what makes your eyes do that thing

How have phones not had an unsend text feature develop yet? Apollo thought this conversation was a good alternative to digging around in the memories he has tried to repress, but all he is doing is giving himself some to newly repress.

-Very eloquent. You have some trouble with your rhetoric classes, ja? ;)

At least I know how to stick to ONE language at a time

Apollo can at least be grateful that Clay isn’t here. They would probably be fighting for the phone, Clay having decided that Apollo should respond to the flirting in kind.

- :( -It’s part of my charm, I’ll have you know.

Answering questions directly is not, apparently

-It would be a very boring conversation otherwise -You want this to sound like a cross examination? ;)

Implying those ever answer questions directly

-You are as ever correct XD

Even Trucy doesn’t use this many emoticons. What did Klavier call this office -- a liminal space? Apollo certainly feels like he has slipped through to the other side of something.

-I’m quite flattered that you’ve spent enough time staring into my eyes to notice ;)

He really is a fuckboy, but of the most benign sort. (Clay has some horror stories about guys he’s texted with.)

-But yes, that is what that is

How did you get like that Like where does a gift like that come from

-I wouldn’t call it a gift precisely -If I’d wanted to talk about it I would’ve explained it when we talked - :) -Does that smiley make it read more or less passive-aggressive? -I’m going for less -I don’t think it worked

He’s trying to be nice, and Apollo thinks he shouldn’t be laughing at that, but he does. It’s ridiculous. There’s nothing about this that isn’t ridiculous. “This is my life now,” Apollo says aloud to the empty, cursed office.

But it is true that Klavier dodged the question at the cafe, how do you know, to the point that it made him seem as suspicious as Phoenix. If there was ever a time to tell, it was there.

It’s fine

Does that seem passive-aggressive? Now’s when he does need Clay over his shoulder.

Does the prosecutors office have as little work as I do or are you just slacking off

This is a good place to lie down and die, right here on the floor of the office. Rest in peace, Apollo: can’t fucking make small talk without sounding like a jerk. There’s a reason that Clay manages to make friends and get dates while Apollo can do neither.

-I’ll have you know I am excellent at multitasking :) -Do you really have so few cases?

Suddenly Apollo regrets bringing it up. “Buddy, you have no idea,” he mutters.

A whole 0 for September

- :(

“Apollo, why are you lying on the floor?”

He tilts his head back and sees Trucy flinging her backpack onto the couch and grabbing her hat from the piano. The afternoon has worn on without him noticing and she is back from school, ready to liven up the office by annoying him

“Changes in perspective help my thinking,” he says.

“What’re ya thinking about?” She plops down on the floor next to him. “Who ya texting?”

“Oh, it’s, uh…” She is already giving him that doubtful look. “...Prosecutor Gavin,” he admits, and her eyes go wide. “I had a question for him about--”

He doesn’t have to try and lie about what they’re talking about -- he could say Machi’s case, but that is months old now, last of the details wrapped up -- because his phone buzzes and her squeal interrupts him. “You have Prosecutor Gavin’s number? Since when? Why did he give it to you? That’s so cool, Polly!”

“It’s really not -- he’s really not -- stop trying to read my messages!”

“Children, children, please.” They both freeze at Phoenix’s voice, and Apollo recovers quicker, yanking his phone away from Trucy and scrambling upright. “If you’re going to kill each other, do it somewhere else, because I don’t want to deal with the hassle of having a murder right here in this office.”

“Daddy!” Trucy cries, springing to her feet. “I thought you were gonna be out late again!”

“So did I,” he says with a tired grin that doesn’t do anything to distract from the lines of exhaustion beneath his eyes. “But my ‘secret project’ is coming to the end of its first phase, soon, and I might have some more time to be around.” He glances about at the mess of the office, a Sisyphean task that Apollo has tried to deal with before only for Trucy to immediately disturb all of his hard work while searching for a prop that he thought he put away in a logical place. “Don’t look so upset about that prospect, Apollo.”

“Wh -- I wasn’t --”

Wright laughs, and Apollo stalks back to his desk, remembering only after a few more minutes that he had another text.

-That office might not be *cursed* but I wouldn’t be surprised if you’ve had some prospective clients run far and fast from the doorstep. No slight against you ;) but it’s quite the unsettling place

Apollo sinks into his chair. When he got here, he didn’t have to dust anything in “his” part of the office, though Trucy told him they were basically just using it for storage. Even the back of the piano has never gotten dusty, and while Apollo takes care of the plants now, they were flourishing through what must have been neglect, based on everything he knows about Trucy and Phoenix. There’s a thermostat he’s never thought about touching, his suit jacket flung over the back of the couch that he’s never had to think about wearing.

I’ve never found it unsettling Though that itself was kinda unsettling when I first came here Like it’s TOO welcoming

-I wouldn’t fall asleep there -Don’t know where you might find yourself if you let your guard down

Like anywhere’s gonna be much worse than here

-Ja, you say that, and then…

Yeah probably shouldn’t push my luck Since I don’t have much of it in the first place

A week later, Apollo is well aware of his luck.

That old whisper, Gramarye, crescendos. Trucy tells him that Valant is back in town, though she hasn’t seen him. She knows like everyone knows that long-ago name, and Apollo knows that something is stirring. “How much magic was there in the troupe?” he asks Trucy one afternoon, curious himself but also put up to it by Clay, who has wanted to know every detail about Valant’s role in the case at the concert while insisting that the Gramaryes are definitely witches and definitely shouldn’t be trusted. “Real magic, not tricks.”

“It’s all real magic, Polly,” Trucy says, grinning at his sullen look. “Gotta keep the mystery intact!”

“Is that just how you say ‘I was too young to remember’?”

She is the one now frowning at she stares at the old faded portrait hanging above the piano. “No comment,” she says. After another minute, she adds, “No, I do remember it was real. Grandpappy especially. He could do strange things. He gave me Mr Hat, I think.”

“Gave you?” Nothing is given with magic, not without price. Nothing for free.

She nods, her expression still one of pinched concentration, but any further speculation on the matter is undercut by the opening of the door and Phoenix’s entrance. “Hi there, stranger!” Trucy chirps.

And Apollo wishes that he had stayed a stranger, because in just a few minutes, his plans for the day -- nothing, noodles, and maybe Trucy dragging him on a hopeless quest around the city to find and say hi to Valant -- are ground to dust. Phoenix gives to Trucy a sealed envelope to be opened “when it’s time”, and to Apollo the beginnings of a headache and the fervent wish that one day Phoenix would tell him literally anything in advance. He would have liked to know that he would be the Jurist System guinea pig, to have time to learn more about the proposed system than the two-minute crash course that Phoenix gives before throwing him out the door to meet his new client. And the client herself says nothing at all but just gives them the location of the crime scene.

“That’s just how Mr Wright is,” Ema says, leaning up against the shelf of paints in the studio, after giving it an experimental push to test its stability. There isn’t much space left uncluttered by paintings, supplies, or the tools of the police investigation, and it leaves Apollo, Trucy, and the bottle of poison detectant spray that Ema gave them with a lot of ground to cover.

“You could be doing this,” he says, waving the bottle at her. She shrugs. He had complained to her on arrival about Phoenix, to learn that he had told her they were coming. She followed this with nodding and grumbling in a way that Apollo presumed meant she wasn’t listening to his grievances, until she had spoken.

“I tried everywhere -- I want to see if your eyes can find something different.” Ema picks up a small can of paint and examines it, looking bored. “But anyway, Mr Wright, he’s -- it’s probably not you,” she continues. “I mean, it could be. I don’t actually know you off the crime scene. But he doesn’t trust anyone -- he’s got the right idea. I learned that much from that case I worked with him; if you don’t trust anyone you can’t get burned.”

“What a sad way to live,” Apollo says. Her assessment makes sense with what he has dealt with of Phoenix. He glances over at Trucy, who isn’t looking at them.

“Yeah,” Ema says quietly. “Sad. That’s the word. We kept in touch for a year or two after I went to Europe, and that’s how I felt about him. That he’s the loneliest man on earth.”

Trucy yells for them to come look at the traces of atroquinine she found, and they return to rote investigation.

“Where did you get that, Miss Trucy?” Valant splutters, reaching for, at the same time Apollo does, the envelope that slipped from Trucy’s pocket. In the midst of the case, and longing for a normal client, he had almost forgotten about Phoenix’s mystery Recycle-Your-Plastics-Day gift.

So much for rote investigation. Apollo doesn’t know why he bothers hoping.

“Daddy gave it to me,” she says. “My Phoenix Wright daddy.”

Valant grabs it from the ground before Apollo can, holding it in trembling hands and squinting, his face gone gray and bloodless. “This signature -- do you not recognize it? It is Zak’s!”

“My -- my daddy?”

Apollo snatches the envelope from Valant. Rude, unquestionably, and probably worthy of a minor curse or two, but he doesn’t trust anything to do with the Gramaryes and he doesn’t like the way Valant was looking at the envelope. “Polly!” Trucy scolds. He’ll worry about it another time. “Daddy said not to open it yet,” she adds, to Valant, and his face falls.

As quickly as he can, Apollo makes an excuse about them having to hunt down the reporter, the witness to the crime -- and they really do have to find him, and that is what they came looking for Valant for -- and drags Trucy away. Maybe Klavier and Phoenix’s paranoia is rubbing off on him. Maybe it’s justified.

Surely it’s justified, by the time they make it back around to the studio -- the reporter is nigh-useless and gives Apollo nothing but insight into the reason that Valant apparently doesn’t like him -- and find that the rough sketches beneath the forgeries -- because the paintings are all forgeries, of course, the victim is a forger, because there are layers of crime on top of crime, of course -- are of Apollo’s three big cases, the three that involved Wright and the Gavins. If he had thought that Brushel, the reporter, was a lunatic before, now he is really feeling it -- he would kill to disentangle himself from this magic madness, and there’s the man chasing Valant for a seven-year-old story.

No, Apollo is probably cursed -- somehow, even when the players in this mess that is his life are human -- and this is what it has left him with.

The last thing Vera says before the start of the trial is, “Do they… allow dogs in?”

Her eyes are fixed over Apollo’s shoulder and he turns, only spotting the feathery fan of a tail as it slips around the corner. After a month of no sightings, trying and failing to tell himself that he could put the matter out of his mind because neither he nor Phoenix has died yet -- here it is, just when he very much does not need to be more nervous.

Prosecutor Gavin seems different -- different from the two other times Apollo has faced him in the courtroom, and very different from their conversation just a week ago. He is ever-quick with objections, but even quicker to snap at and shut down the defense. Apollo doesn’t need any special tricks to see that he has been rattled by something, that he knows something they don’t. At the name Gramarye, he breaks, the last of his faint composure shattering, turning on the defendant with a force and fury that Apollo has never seen from him. Vera shrinks away, almost trying to tuck herself beneath the witness stand, like that can save her.

Like all things, it seems, they are coming back to Phoenix Wright. Wright, his forgeries, and Klavier.

And Apollo knowing nothing, told nothing, left without a clue in the face of Klavier’s snarl. “He’s told you nothing about this, has he? Your soiled, sullied mentor -- nothing?”

Nothing but that he is human, and that had to be pried from him. Apollo doesn’t say anything and lets Klavier explain the evidence, a page of a diary, that seven years ago got Wright disbarred -- the diary page that Vera, the real forger, Apollo’s client (his kingdom for a normal client), created. And she and her father were hired to do that, and their client—

The answer, the final answer, to that mystery of seven years -- did he do it? -- lies at their fingertips. All there is left is to ask. Apollo’s question -- desperate, pleading, “Vera! For all our sakes, who asked you to forge that evidence? Who was it?” -- could end in exoneration or damnation for the man Apollo once so admired.

(It never ends so simply.)

“I remember so clearly,” she mumbles, hugging her sketchbook to herself, swaying slightly in place. Poor girl; she must be terrified. She stops and turns her eyes again on Klavier, like she has before, an unblinking stare while her lips move absently, as though she is talking to herself, trying to understand something. “Who gave me the… the diary. It was…” She wobbles again, staggering and bracing herself with one hand on the stand.

“Is she okay—”

Trucy doesn’t get to finish her question. Klavier is moving from the bench, toward the witness, even while Vera is still, barely, holding herself upright, and no longer looking at him. “It was --” She reaches for her throat, the last words brittle and barely forced from her lips. “It was the devil.”

She crumples to the ground with a last strangled gasp. The gallery bursts into a flurry of sound and activity, the judge adding to it as he tries to yell for a bailiff at the same time as he demands order. Trucy shoves Apollo out to the witness stand, where Klavier has knelt next to Vera, first there because he first moved -- because he moved even before she fell. Like he knew what was coming. He looks up at Apollo and eyes are wild, not flickering between hues but almost cloudy, glazed over, vacant, even though it is obvious that Klavier is, like the rest of them, far too present in this moment. His voice has lost almost all trace of his accent and it sends a shudder down Apollo’s spine. He sounds like Kristoph. He sounds just like Kristoph.

When they leave the courtroom, Trucy again pulling Apollo along with her to see if they can learn what hospital Vera was taken to, they leave Klavier still on the floor, frozen like a statue, and the hellhound circling the stand and him. At first Apollo doesn’t think he sees it -- which doesn’t make any sense, does it? -- but then it bumps its head into his face. He reaches a hand to rub its fur without looking at it, his eyes still fixed on some distant point far above.

“Apollo Justice speaking.”

“Mr Justice? This is the Hickfield Clinic. You are the attorney for Ms Vera Misham, correct?”

“I -- yes, that’s me. How is she doing?”

“She is alive but unconscious in intensive care, not to be disturbed for any reason.”

“What happened to her?”

“We aren’t sure yet. It’s going to take some time to determine any more about her condition, because your client, Mr Justice -- she isn’t human.”

“Aren’t there privacy laws that telling you that sort of thing goes against?” Trucy asks. They are sitting on the steps in front of the courthouse, watching the extra swarm of police cars begin to depart. They haven’t seen Klavier leave the building, and Phoenix finds the two of them and ushers them onto their feet and away.

“There’s no time to sit around -- you’ve got a case to solve, right?”

“Our client just nearly died, Mr Wright.”

“Then it’s more important than ever that you find out what happened, yes?” Phoenix claps Apollo on the shoulder and pushes some files into Trucy’s hands. “Though, actually, Trucy, can you take those to Edgeworth? And let him know what’s happening down here.”

“C’mon Polly!” she says, about to skip down the stairs, and Phoenix stops her.

“No, Apollo’s coming back to the office with me. There’s some old case information I think he’ll find relevant. Maybe it even won’t be boring.”

“But shouldn’t I get to know it too?” Trucy asks. “I want to know!”

Phoenix shakes his head. “No, you wouldn’t enjoy it.”

Apollo watches for red and sees none. Trucy rushes off ahead of them, leaving Apollo with Phoenix, acutely aware that the last time it was just the two of them was that conversation over Phoenix’s humanity -- and assumed lack thereof -- and the presence of the hellhound. He glances around again, expecting it to have followed him out of the building. “I’m surprised she didn’t see right through you sending her away,” Apollo says. Phoenix snorts. “You could have told me that Vera isn’t human, too.”

“I could have, yes.” Phoenix starts walking again. Apollo wishes he had something that he could throw at the back of his head. “But that wasn’t a relevant matter when this case began.”

“So now it is?”

“There is a lot that is relevant now, Apollo.” Phoenix’s eyes are blue when he turns his head. “And you aren’t close to being caught up to where I am -- and where Klavier doubtlessly is.”

“What do you think he knows?” Apollo asks.

“Oh, almost everything. I’m sure he’s figured out the real killer by now -- I think he would be able to see that.” Phoenix smiles. Apollo wants to scream in his face that a girl is nearly dead and her father is and there is a broken legal system that needs their help and everything is just jokes with him, an empty poker gaze. “You wouldn’t be able to tell from across the courtroom, but I was watching, and this whole trial, he never let up with his Sight.”

“What does that mean?” Apollo asks. “Do you -- you don’t always see that whole magic aura stuff?”

“God, no.” Phoenix laughs. “What you saw through the magatama, what I can see when I choose” -- his eyes flash again -- “no human is meant to stare at that for any length of time. Our brains just aren’t built to take it all in.”

“Then why would Prosecutor Gavin do that, if it’s just going to drive him crazy or whatever?”

“He was looking for something,” Phoenix says. “And he saw it.”

Back at the office, Phoenix unlocks the bottom drawer of his desk. The magatama sits on top of a stack of papers, mostly handwritten, and barely readable. But the date on them is clear: April, seven years ago.

“Are you sure you’re human, Mr Wright?”

“I thought you could see that plainly for yourself.”

“You have quite the ‘eye’ yourself, don’t you? Though you should be able to… see that mine isn’t so good now.”

“...”

“I ask because only one man before has ever beaten me in a game of poker, and he was very much not human.”

“And who was he?”

“The man I ‘killed’, of course.”

#roddy fanfics #ace attorney bullshit tag #UP NEXT: FLASHBACK #fic: the seelie of kurain

10 notes · View notes