( No Title )
Head Games, Law Games (4969 words) by thesavagesabretooth
Summary: Phoenix Wright thought that the strange game between him and Kristoph Gavin had ended for good when he put his lover and rival in jail for murder. But when Miles Edgeworth agrees to have the killer mentally evaluated for suitability to start working in the courts from behind bars, Phoenix has to find out for himself just what’s going on in Kristoph’s head.
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August 26, 2028– 4:30 pm
Phoenix nervously adjusted the position of the snacks on the table as he waited for Trucy to get back from her magic practice. He had gone overboard– he knew he had gone overboard, with everything from cake, to chips, to tea and candies– but he was worried about upsetting her. Every time he’d thought about it he’d added another snack to the table.
He heard the keys in the door, and stiffened, leaning over the table.
The door flew open in its usual way, and Trucy Wright bounded in as she tossed her hat and cloak on the rack with a laugh.
“HAH! I knew I’d get Betty to start working with me sooner or later! Daddy!! I’m ho—” Her eyes went to the table full of snacks with wide eyes “…is it my birthday or is something up?”
“Hey bug, welcome home!” he waved her over. “I think you’d know if it was your birthday, right?”
Skipping over, Trucy came to a stop before the table with her hands folded behind her back.
“Unless I magically gained another birthday? Yeah, probably…which means something’s up…not that I’m gonna complain, of course!”
“Well, I’m glad you don’t want to complain,” he said. He pulled out a chair for her. “I promise it’s really nothing huge. I just wanted to treat you.”
Trucy dropped into the chair with a tap of her gloved finger on her chin, before she grinned. “Well. In that case…thank you VERY much for the meal, daddy!”
“So how was practice? Is Betty still being snippy about the whole thing?”
Phoenix slid tea and a slice of cake toward her. He was absolutely stalling. He had no idea how to start this conversation.
Trucy gave him that uncanny look of hers, where it felt like she was staring straight into his soul, before she grinned and grabbed the tea cup and the cake to put it on her lap.
She took a bite and popped it in her mouth before she hummed “Betty’s still grumpy, but I actually managed to twist her arm enough to work through a possible routine. I just had to lean on Bonny’s puppy dog eyes and the promise of a big show to make it happen.”
“At least it’s all coming together, right? I’ll be excited to see it when you guys actually have a show in the works.”
He still felt guilty for not being able to be there for her first big show– or for the disaster that it turned into. Trucy in Gramaryeland had turned into Trucy in Court on a Murder Charge. What a disaster. At least Apollo had been able to handle it…
“Yeah…I mean…I’m trying to think of a good hook, you know? And there’s the matter of booking it.” She sighed and popped another piece of cake in her mouth. “Which is harder than you’d think when the last guy who helped you with it tried to frame you for murder.”
“Yeah,” Phoenix grimaced. “I actually have a couple of contacts in TV we could talk to. Way less likely to try to frame you for murder. They’re more the type to get framed, honestly. That’s how we met.”
Trucy perked up with a grin as she held her tea up to her lips. “you mean Mr. Powers and Ms. Nichols and all of them, right??”
“Exactly,” he nodded. “I bet they could put us in touch with someone. No need to rely on shady contacts.”
He knew that Trucy had first gotten connected with Retinz through Klavier Gavin. He didn’t want to hold that against Klavier, he knew it wasn’t his fault. But still he somehow wasn’t surprised that the bad connection had started with a Gavin.
Unfortunately, the dark thought must have shown on his face.
Trucy sipped her tea before she finally said. “Daddy, you’re kind of a terrible liar. What’s really up?”
He sighed and rubbed his chin. “Well I mean I wasn’t lying, sweetheart. But you’re right. I was stalling. Mr. Edgeworth asked me to talk about something with you. Well, actually he was going to talk to you himself, but I said I would.”
Ominous, Nick. That sounds ominous. Say something else before she has a chance to–“This is getting pretty ominous daddy. What? What is it? A mother back from the dead? Am I being accused of murder again? A…” Her eyes widened and a grin alighted upon her face “ARE YOU GETTING MARRIED?”
Phoenix made an incoherent sputtering noise as his mind went suddenly blank, and he threw up his hands.
“What? No! Who would I even marry? Don’t answer that–” he grimaced and fixed his tie, flushing at the thought of all the possible names that Trucy might pull out. “No, no it’s.. it’s about your dad, Trucy. Well, about his killer.”
Segueing right from marriage to Kristoph made his stomach churn. Once upon a time, Gavin could have been on the list of people Trucy might pull out of her hat for her opinion on a surprise engagement.
“Oh.” Trucy’s smile fell from her face. “…this is about Mr. Kristoph, huh?”
“Yeah,” he sighed, shoulders slumping. “Sorry, kiddo. Not exactly an exciting and fun conversation, I know.”
He gestured at the snacks in a tacit acknowledgement of his own pre-apology.
Trucy sighed and grabbed a candy from the table to open it with a puff of her cheeks.
“…you coulda told me right away…but I like the snacks.” She popped it in her mouth “…did he die?”
Phoenix grimaced again. He didn’t like the way that the suggestion made him jolt and hurry to answer.
“No, no he didn’t die, uh. Not exactly the opposite, but well. His case is being… considered.”
“Good… I mean, good that he didn’t die.” She tucked her hair over her ear with a tired smile. “I know he did a lot of really shitty things, but I still got a lot of happy memories of those years when you and he were friends, daddy.”
“You do, huh?” Phoenix smiled awkwardly and rubbed the back of his neck. The truth was, as much as he didn’t like it, he did too. “I guess even the worst people have their good sides, huh? But anyway, uh, okay, so you remember about Prosecutor Blackquill?”
Trucy nodded as she sipped her tea. “…how he was prosecuting in handcuffs? Or do you mean his whole samurai spy thing with Mr. Fulbright?”
“No, uh, the prosecuting in handcuffs thing, you were right the first time,” Phoenix grimaced. Now that he’d put his life back together, he sometimes worried about the things that he exposed Trucy to. He ripped the bandaid off. “Kristoph has asked the prosecutor’s office for the same deal.”
“Oh!” Trucy’s eyes widened behind her fringe of brown hair. “….he did??”
“He did,” Phoenix sighed, leaning his elbows on the table. “And Lana Skye made his case for him to Edgeworth. So Edgeworth is considering it.”
“The fact he convinced Edgeworth is kinda crazy enough.” Trucy leaned on her hands “I mean, even enough to consider it…”
“It is,” Phoenix said with a frown. “Edgeworth is not happy about it. I’m not happy about it. But he said he’d seriously consider it, so here we are. He had Athena talk to him, first off.”
Trucy sipped her tea again with a tilt of her head. “…and what’d she say? I know she’s pretty good with this kinda stuff.”
Phoenix sighed, and closed his eyes. He wondered for a moment if he should tell her the whole truth of just what Kristoph had said. About why he’d killed her father.
“They talked for a while,” he said finally. “She doesn’t think he’s a risk. It… surprised me.”
“Kind of a surprise to me too, y-ya know. Given the whole multiple homicide thing. But…” Trucy rubbed her neck. “ I mean, Athena’s no stranger to that, is she?”
“No, I guess she’s not,” he said. “She’s good at seeing the good in people. But it wasn’t only her opinion that Edgeworth wanted. I think you can guess why I’m talking to you.”
Trucy fell back against the chair with a furrow of her brow. “…because you wanna know if I’ll tell Edgeworth to give him another chance, right?”
“Yeah,” Phoenix sighed. He flattened down over the table on his elbows. “I’m mean, obviously we’re not talking about letting him out of prison. Just giving him a chance to work in court.”
At this point, anyway. Phoenix had no doubt that Kristoph’s end goal was absolutely to weasel his way out of prison, and back into the world.
“I know Mr. Gavin sure loved working in court.” Trucy murmured with a shaky smile. “…I mean…if it’s only that, I don’t see why not. R-right?”
“Trucy….” He reached a hand over to her, looking at her shaky smile. “Come on. I think we can both agree there’s a very good ‘why not’ right? No matter what you decide– it’s not like there’s no reason you should hesitate. Kristoph might have been my friend for a while– even your friend– but, he killed people.”
Trucy’s smile seemed at its limit, and her shoulders shook a little as she took his hand. She looked down at her lap
“I know. But so did Mr. Halblicht. It’s..”“I mean…I’ll be honest, it’d be easier if I had any answers at all, you know? I have no idea why he went from my friend one day to …” she shrugged her shaking shoulders. “beating my dad to death and trying to poison my friend the next.”
Phoenix squeezed her hand. “Trucy… I wish I had more answers for you than I do. I don’t know why he poisoned the Mishams, at least, I don’t know why he thinks he did. But…”
He had too many secrets from her. He was already keeping the secret of her mother, and her brother from her. Thalassa had sworn him to secrecy.
But Zak Gramarye had done no such thing.
Still, he hesitated.
Trucy stared at him with a serious little frown.
“But there’s….there’s something you do know, Daddy? You have to tell me. If there’s something that’s relevant here you gotta tell me.”
He sighed, and squeezed her hand. “I know, kiddo. It’s not going to make you happy though.”
It didn’t make him happy, either. It made him… confused. Angry that Kristoph somehow felt he was more moral for murdering someone than Phoenix was for not murdering them. But there was this strange sense of horrible, sick…if not pleasure, then satisfaction perhaps, knowing that Kristoph at least had been trying to protect Trucy, in his own fucked up way.
And it made him feel sick that he wondered if he agreed with him– that it was more than Phoenix ever had done.
Trucy’s lips were downturned…her expression increasingly concerned. “you’re starting to make me nervous, daddy…”
“He told Athena why he killed your father, Trucy. Or at least, why he claims, though, she believes him.”
Phoenix almost felt more cornered now than he ever did in court.
Trucy’s eyes briefly widened, and then narrowed with a familiar sort of dogged determination “…so why? Why’d he kill my daddy?”
Phoenix squeezed her hand, and stared down at the table, his head in his hand.
“He told Athena that he did it for you. Because he abandoned you.”
Trucy was silent. She didn’t say a word as he felt her fingers curl against his. He heard the pace of her breathing pick up as she squeezed a little tighter for a moment.
Finally, she said only one word.
“Oh.”
“Yeah.” He didn’t know if there was anything else he could say. He struggled to find words. “Its… still not a good reason.”
Trucy’s voice cracked as she shook in her chair .“…he killed him because he abandoned me. It’s…it’s…I…”
Phoenix scooted his chair around the table closer to her, and put his arm around her.
I shouldn’t have told her. I just should have kept my big fat mouth shut.Trucy grabbed him tightly in a hug.
“Daddy was always gonna abandon me. I knew it from the day he left me in the courthouse.” She squeezed Phoenix tighter “and it hurt,a lot. It was like…family was just another excuse for a vanishing act to the Gramaryes. That it’s just what family was. But it still hurt.”
“I know, honey,” Phoenix murmured. He squeezed Trucy, and he felt his chest tighten. She had known, she had always known. Zak Gramarye had been planning to play them all from the very beginning. The horrible thought that maybe he deserved to die flashed through his mind. “It wasn’t fair to you. It was terrible.”
It wasn’t fair to Phoenix, either. What the hell did Zak Gramarye think he was doing? Who was going to raise Zak’s daughter when he disappeared. Valant sure fucking wasn’t!
Trucy shrugged against him, sniffling softly.
“it was always gonna happen. Every magic act has a sleight of hand, and something used to make the trick work.” she shook her head against him and he felt hot tears on his shirt. “If the trick goes off smoothly, whatever happens to the tool doesn’t matter. Fair has nothing to do with it.”
“Trucy that’s–” he held her to his chest. “You can’t treat people like that. People aren’t just tools for magical acts. What your father did to you was as wrong as what Kristoph did to him.”
Did that mean it balanced out?
Trucy hiccuped. Her fingers squeezed his shoulders tightly.
“D-dunno. I gotta think about it, Daddy…but…it’s the Gramarye way. What daddy did…maybe… maybe it was worse than what Mr. Gavin did.” She looked up at him with tears in her eyes “I mean…Daddy abandoned me to survive on my own …twice, for himself. Nobody else. But Mr. Gavin might have killed him for me.”
Phoenix held his daughter and he felt ashamed of himself. Ashamed of not dragging her real father in to face her, and own up to what he’d done.
And ashamed for almost feeling grateful to Kristoph for killing him.
“Trucy, you can’t just kill people for being awful,” he murmured. “But… I can’t blame you for feeling that way. I’m not crying for your father.”
“I KNOW I can’t, Daddy!” She reached up to wipe her eyes. “obviously it’s still wrong…but if he really was trying to protect me then…”
She pressed her hand to her face “…I..I give Mr. Edgeworth my approval. But I’m gonna have to think about this for a little while.”
Phoenix gathered her to his chest, and rested his chin gently on the top of her head. “Take all the time you need, bug.”
He was sure as hell going to be thinking about it for a long time.
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