Chapter Text
It was the type of day outside that could sow sadness in the heart of the sun. A funereal heather sky blanketed the city and wept fat raindrops on those below, relentless in its onslaught of misery. Phoenix Wright watched idly as the downpour soaked the asphalt outside and distantly wondered if it was the weather affecting his mood or the other way around. The rain traveled down the hill in great sliding sheets, occasionally torn asunder by a car ripping through the glassine surface. His ears caught the gentle pattern of droplets that made their way onto the office window and he stared past them, feeling unmotivated.
His thoughts traveled, as usual, to his old friend and rival. Where the thought of him might once have inspired hope or determination, however, a bitter ache rose deep within him. He fought valiantly to prevent it from turning to anger, to keep the tide of resentment at bay, but each passing hour wore him just a little further down. His fingers clenched threateningly against the handle on his coffee mug. He had always prided himself on being a patient man, but if anyone could truly bring it out of him, if anyone could really bait him into a reaction, it was Miles Edgeworth. Unsurprising, he sneered to himself, given that the man yearned for perfection in all aspects of his life. Why wouldn’t he so expertly control the feelings of those around him, as well?
The coffee clutched in his hand had long since gone cold, trembling gently within its ceramic confines as he tried halfheartedly to relax his grip. He briefly entertained the thought of simply tracking the man down and popping him one good one, right in the mouth, as payback for all he’d put the attorney through. What would Edgeworth do, he wondered, if he settled it that way? Could he take a punch? Would he hit back? Phoenix held back a snort and watched with disinterest as another car sped past, splashing a filthy puddle up onto the sidewalk. With his luck, Edgeworth would have taken up bare-fisted boxing as a hobby to compliment his multilingual prosecuting career. Probably titled in it.
His mood soured further. It was impossible for him to prevent it, really. His chest was heavy with years of effort and struggle. Seventeen years he had worked tirelessly to track down his friend. If he closed his eyes, he compulsively saw the five horrifying words that had neatly stained the expensive parchment left centered on a polished desk. It had stopped his heart cold then, and even now it caused sorrow to well threateningly in his belly. He wished desperately that he could erase the memory from his mind, if nothing else than to stop seeing it in his nightmares. Prosecutor Miles Edgeworth chooses death. His eyes slid over to his desk where he knew the letter resided still, hidden under ample layers of paperwork and file folders. It had taken a long time to convince Gumshoe to hand it over.
Of all the things the man could have written, he chose to paint himself as dead. It hurt Phoenix to wonder what had been going through the man's mind as he had scrawled the words. Did he even think about his friends? Did it ever occur to him what they might believe? He was certainly smart enough to draw a logical deduction from his own actions. He did it in court all the time given only the barest minimum of clues, so what was it? His mind wandered briefly to their interaction following the prosecutor’s double acquittal. They had been comfortable, almost amiable, as they fielded the overwhelming congratulations from the rest of the team. He remembered thinking that it was finally over, that they could finally begin rebuilding what they had so delicately set in place as children. It had taken a tremendous tragedy and countless hours of emotional exhaustion but… He finally had his friend back.
Weeks later, he had received a phone call that took precedence over any other memory he could recall. “You, uh, might wanna sit down for this, pal...” He winced against the words, as vivid as if he were hearing it for the first time despite having remembered the hesitant phrase hundreds, if not thousands, of times since that call. “...We, uh... We found a letter from Mister Edgeworth...”
It was much easier to strive for the low-hanging fruit and mock his childhood friend's success than to try and figure out what to do moving forward. Now that the undiluted, murderous pain and sorrow had come to pass in the last several months, it was easier to embrace the anger and betrayal and personal projection. Deep down he knew that he was being petty by ignoring the very real struggles the man had obviously endured, but it simply felt too good to resent him right now.
He sipped absentmindedly at his beverage, grimacing at the temperature but too stubborn to heat it back up. For all his adolescent years of searching and calling and writing letters, of abandoning his dreams to pursue law school, of studying for the bar exam, of the raw terror underlying his first case, of Mia's death... For all of it, this was his reward? He scowled. The unfamiliar expression carved wrinkles into his youthful face, awkward in their newness, and he hated the reflection he saw in the window but could not find it in himself to erase it.
There was movement behind him. He turned, trying valiantly to soften his expression, and spotted Maya fussing over Charlie, their office plant. She was maneuvering a large pitcher of water around the pervasive leaves in an attempt to water the tree but was doing a poor job of masking the fact that she was more interested in checking on him instead. As water splashed over the expensive decorative pot, he sighed and tried to smile. “You spill any more of that on the carpet and it'll start to look like it does outside.”
As predicted, the medium squawked in surprise and a great deal more water splashed onto the floor. Maya whirled, tucking the pitcher behind her back, and put on her best thousand-watt smile. “It'll dry in no time! Besides, if I didn't water this thing, nobody would.” She paused for a moment to see if her cheer had any effect in lightening his mood. Seconds crawled by, marked by the pervasive ticking of the cheap office clock above them. Her smile faltered. “Nick—”
“I'm fine, Maya.”
“You're not fine.” The pitcher found its way onto the floor, still partially filled with water. He turned back to the window as she approached, wishing he were a better actor. How times had changed. “You've been like this for days. Ever since you saw Mr. Edg—”
“Don't say his name.”
An exasperated sigh accompanied a dramatic eye roll. “It's not a curse, you know! Ever since he came back you've been sulking around like a scolded child! I thought we were finally done with this!”
He was sorely tempted to cross his arms and realized it would only prove her point. It irritated him that she was right, and he didn't really have it in him to argue with her. When he said nothing, Maya padded over to him and laid a gentle hand on his forearm. His eyes trailed down and stared blankly at the short, pale fingers. He knew that she didn't deserve to weather his mood, and especially not for this long, but where he attempted to muster his usual spunk, he drew only a blank. It frustrated him and yet he was powerless against it. “I'm sorry.”
Maya paused in a rare moment of consideration. “I know you've spent most of your life trying to find him. And then you found him and he was a huge jerk. And just when you thought things were okay again, he—” her voice caught in her throat; she, too, had felt the pain of mourning too recently, “—well, I guess I would be pretty upset, too. What are you going to do now?”
“I don't know.” He searched his mind for an answer and came up with nothing. Right now, he was feeling betrayed and a little hurt, and he was tired. He thought it had finally been getting better, or at least a little easier, but now… He briefly recalled the moment he’d seen the other man in public, unaware that he’d been spotted. His back had been turned while he stood in line at a news cart, but Phoenix could have carved a statue of the other man from memory. All it took was the flash of fine, ashen hair in the wind and the shock of his signature red suit against the ocean of blacks and blues and his world had been flipped on its end once again. “I spent nearly two decades trying to reach out to him. As far as I'm concerned, I think it's his turn, now.”
“You really think he'll make it up to you?”
Phoenix mulled the idea over. Miles Edgeworth had never been one to wear his heart on his sleeve, even before tragedy had originally parted them in their childhood. He had always been the stoic introvert, offering nothing more or less than he felt was absolutely necessary for the topic at hand. Still, it wasn't like he didn't care about people. It was obvious, at least to Phoenix, that there were those the prosecutor considered friends and looked out for them in his own way. On the other hand, after almost eighteen years of perhaps deliberately convincing himself otherwise, it was quite possible they were right back at square one. He shrugged. “Who knows? Edgeworth is a genius intellectually, but emotionally...? He might not even realize how much it upset everyone. For all I know he could send a notarized letter of apology for his absence and consider it a done deal.”
To his surprise, there was a small giggle next to him. When he glanced down, Maya spread her hands in front of her and jutted her elbows out, as if reading a very official letter on a large desk. “To Phoenix Wright, Attorney at Law,” she took a dramatically deep breath, “please accept my deepest apologies for my recent trespasses,” her voice was overly deep and sharp, mocking the cultured tongue of the prosecutor, “for I had not considered that faking my own death and running away to Europe for nearly a year would be a cause for such upset. Sincerely,” she pretended to dip a pen into a bottle of ink and signed the invisible letter with a dramatic flourish, “Prosecutor Miles Edgeworth.”
Despite himself, he laughed out loud. The more he entertained the idea, the more he really could imagine the other man producing such a letter. He draped an arm around the spirit medium's shoulders and gave her a brief squeeze. “Thanks, Maya. If you bump into him, maybe you could offer up your services as a ghostwriter.” It felt good to grin at her. “Even if you are a bit rude.”
“If we don't pick up a case soon, I may have to. It's almost time for bills to start coming in again.”
“You always say that, and yet we continue to make it just fine.”
“Maybe you could use your spare time to try and reach out to him.”
“Or I could set myself on fire.”
“Nick!” A short huff of air revealed that she was getting fed up with him. He supposed even Maya had her limits. “Honestly, the two of you act like you never moved past the fourth grade. Fine.” He could hear the gentle rustling of her clothes as she stormed away from him and began digging around in the desk. “I'll be old and gray before Mister Edgeworth figures out how to say he's sorry, and you apparently are happy to sit there and pout about it.” He felt himself growing a bit nervous as she held up her cell phone triumphantly. Maya was only this motivated for two things: burgers, and—
“I'm gonna get this ball rolling, myself!”
—and butting into the affairs of others. His body moved of its own accord, coffee sloshing over the rim of his mug as he leapt toward the girl. The very last thing in the world he wanted to have happen was for Maya to contact Edgeworth in an effort to rekindle the two of them. She was surprisingly nimble, however, and shoved the imposing leather desk chair in between them to thwart his efforts to snag her phone. He slid the coffee mug onto the desk and rounded the chair, arms outstretched, and watched in horror as she placed the phone up to her ear. “Maya, do not—“
“Hello, is this the prosecutor's office? Is Mister Edgeworth in?”
He felt a growl let loose from his throat. Please don't be there, please be anywhere else...
“Oh, I see, that's too bad...” Maya's face fell, causing Phoenix to cheer inwardly. “Yes, please, if you don't mind. It's Maya Fey.”
He ran his fingers through his hair, wondering just what kind of message she planned to leave. If he devoted half a second of thought to it, he allowed himself to believe that the chances of Edgeworth actually returning her call were slim to none, if he even got it. He bitterly recalled the hundreds of messages he must have left over the years begging for any kind of contact, just a sign that he was alive and okay...
“Hi, Mister Edgeworth, it's Maya Fey...”
He could feel his teeth grinding against each other and found that he was surprisingly anxious. Despite the fact that he knew she was only speaking to a machine, he wondered how the other man would react to her words. Did he even realize that they knew he was back yet? It wasn't like they had spoken to him... He was never unfriendly toward Maya, either, but this was taking things ten steps further than a professional relationship... He could see Edgeworth sitting behind his imposing, expertly polished desk, resting his chin on tented fingertips while he listened to the message.
“...you see, we're in a real bind because Nick can't get his head out of his own you-know-what...”
He turned away from her and glared at the window. It had only been a few seconds that he had seen the other man, but it was impossible to forget. He had spent most of his life remembering the big details and wondering about the small ones, wondering what his friend had turned into, what he looked like now... Having met him in court the first time and seeing just how kind the years had been to him, despite the severity of his trained glower, Phoenix had been breathless for more reasons than one. Of course he had expected to recognize his old friend well enough to pick him out of a crowd, but puberty had hit him like a truck.
“...so if you could maybe talk to him somehow, that would be really great. Okay, hope you're well, and welcome back! We've missed you!”
The distant beep of the call ending snapped him out of his musings. “I can't believe you did that.”
“What's the worst that can happen?” He saw her reflection in the window smirk at him, hands on her hips. “Even if he never calls you back, it's no worse than when he was dead, right?”
This gave him pause. Was it? At least when he thought that the man was dead, there was a reason he wasn't hearing from him. Now that he knew the man had been alive and well the entire time, however... Why hadn’t he reached out? It had been months that had passed without so much as an email. Maybe that was part of why this hurt almost as bad as when he had left in the first place. It was just like before when he had watched from the shadows as Miles, clutching his childhood dog, climbed into the mysterious limousine and then he was gone… He rolled his eyes. “He had every opportunity to talk to me this whole time, Maya. I wouldn't hold your breath.”
“Well, maybe he was afraid to, you know. Maybe he thinks you were mad at him for leaving and you wouldn't want to hear from him. That would make me not want to call someone.” She walked up behind him while he was still lost in thought and pulled the corners of his mouth back. “Might wanna start practicing that smile of yours again, if you want him to believe it.”
“Ack!” He flailed briefly and worked his lips back and forth while glaring at her playfully, trying to think of an appropriate comeback. There was an inkling of truth to what she had said, though. He supposed it was very likely that Edgeworth hadn't reached out because he felt it would be inappropriate. As far as his justification, Phoenix could probably come up with fifteen different reasons the man would assume his closest friends would be upset about hearing from him, ranging from the sensible to the asinine. He sighed. As much as he wanted to continue holding this grudge, it probably would fall on his shoulders to at least start the repairs to their relationship. Again.
He wasn't entirely sure he had it in him this time, even if his anger was ebbing by the minute.
The distant tick, tick, tick of the clock on the wall alerted him to a very distinct lack of noise in the room and he turned slowly, suspicious. One of the things for which he had grown most grateful was having Maya around. Not only did she offer some...occasionally valuable insight in court, but she was simply fun to be around. He knew he had a tendency to get stuck inside of his own head, and thankfully, Maya had a talent for causing enough of a ruckus that it typically stopped his brooding in his tracks. Unfortunately for her, it made it all the more obvious when she was getting up to no good, since silence was generally not her strongest attribute. “Maya? Where'd you go?”
As he turned the corner into the hallway, he caught the spirit medium just as she snapped her phone shut. He felt his stomach drop a smidge further when she gave him yet another winning grin. “I think I figured it out, Nick!”
“Figured what out, exactly?”
“How we're going to solve this issue.” She slid the phone into the belt of her robes and put her hands on her hips, resolute. As he opened his mouth, Maya interrupted the attorney. “And before you say anything, no, that was not Mr. Edgeworth.”
“Who was it?”
“Someone who has as much interest as I do in getting the two of you back together!”
“Geeze, when you put it like that, you make it sound like we're a couple!” Despite himself, his cheeks reddened. Thankfully, Maya didn't notice.
“Well, you're partners, aren't you? At least you were. That’s close enough, isn’t it?” The spirit medium made a show of patting him on his shoulder as she passed by, heading for the door. “You just let the old Maya News Network get to work for you. We'll have you two screaming at each other across the courtroom again in no time.”
“Lovely.” He fought to keep from cringing. The “Maya News Network” was Maya's self-titled gossip chain that, as far as he was aware, was essentially her and maybe two or three other people sticking their noses into the affairs of others. Still, he knew that she meant well, and despite the fact that he found it difficult to believe that Edgeworth would be amenable to a young girl's intervention in his personal life, he was at least willing to watch it play out. After all, he mused, what was the worst that could happen? The man had already been dead to him for a year. No reason to be upset over the decedent being mildly inconvenienced for a little while.
Shaking his head, he trundled over to the couch and sat heavily, lacing his fingers behind his head. Although he felt like he knew his friend’s mannerisms fairly well, it was difficult to come up with a list of reasons why the man would have returned from his life overseas. After all, the life he had left behind here was wrought with terrible accusations of just about every dirty trick in the book shy of perjury, not to mention the inquisitions and politics and who knows what else that had followed the drama surrounding Chief Gant’s surprising involvement. If Phoenix were honest with himself, he wasn’t sure he would have come back, either. Edgeworth didn’t have many close friends, and even fewer material obligations. He had money and connections and linguistic capabilities… so why did he come back?
A very small voice in the back of his head whispered to him.
What if he came back for me?
He snorted audibly and closed his eyes. Ridiculous. He could admit, if only to himself, that on his worst nights where sleep eluded him and the temptation to drink until it didn’t hurt anymore gnawed in his belly, he would allow himself to daydream about Edgeworth coming to his senses and coming back to his friend. He would even admit that on the rarest occasions, he would let those daydreams get out of hand, spiraling madly on to different endings where the prosecutor usually came back and admitted his feelings for Phoenix in a grand, tragically romantic gesture and they made up and lived happily ever after whether the defense attorney indulged his friend’s affections or not. It was easy for him to dream up happy endings and sappy stories and triumphant homecomings because he’d been doing it his entire life about the same person, and yet, they never came true.
But what if this time they did?
He flinched against his own thoughts and tried with a terrible force to quash the hopeless optimist within himself. It was a dangerous path, he knew, to allow these kinds of thoughts to gain footing. Especially now, and especially with Edgeworth. The logical side of him recognized that even if the stoic prosecutor had intended to address Phoenix, it probably wasn’t because he missed him or his friendship or anything of the sort, no matter how badly he wished it to be true. Allowing himself to even cautiously entertain those thoughts only set him up for more disappointment, more silence on the other end of the phone, more nights wondering why he even bothered anymore.
His chest heaved a great sigh and he stood, preparing to head upstairs to his apartment, when he glanced out of his window at the darkening horizon. While the office and the apartment weren’t much to write home about, he had always enjoyed the view from both. The building was set on a relatively steep hill that lead down to the ocean at the bottom, treating onlookers to technicolor sunsets and dramatic storms. Off in the distance against one of the walking paths he spotted a man bundled up in a flowing pea coat that was flapping away in the wind of the storm. Rain still cut down from the sky and Phoenix could imagine that the person, whoever they were, must be completely soaked. He shook his head and squinted at them, impressed that at least somewhere out there apparently existed a human being whose mood was worse than his own.
Distantly, through the ceiling, he heard the familiar electric whine of whatever Samurai series Maya was stuck on this time around. Try as he might, he found it truly impossible to keep up with the various Samurais and their get-ups, but he found it somewhat endearing that his eccentric counterpart found them so fascinating. He figured it must be getting late if the series was starting and he turned away from the lone figure in the rain, briefly wishing them luck with whatever took them out into the storm.
As he traveled around the office furniture to flick off the light, he found it impossible not to wonder what Edgeworth was up to. Irrationally, he turned back to the window for just a moment and gazed across the room, hoping it wasn’t him out there in the downpour. Shaking his head at himself, he stepped out onto the walkway, locked the door, and headed up to bed.