It had been cold that night. That was all that he could remember about the time before. It had been cold, and he was in a tiny little jazz club, listening to the strains of a lone muted trumpet playing over piano chords. I could play piano if I really wanted to. I just didn't care.

He'd contacted the state board to see about retaking the bar exam. They'd all but laughed in his face. Regardless of what he'd been, regardless of how hard he'd worked behind the scenes, it didn't matter. All they saw was the man who had been framed, the man who'd given up hope, the man who hadn't cared if he'd fudged the evidence in his own case seven year later. They saw a worthless former defense attorney that could barely scratch up the funds to retake the test. It wasn't that they'd kept him from reapplying – they'd just made it rather clear that they thought it was a waste of what little money he had.

So he'd taken it to the club instead.

He tilted his head back, running a hand through his hair. It wasn't under a hat, like it had been for so long, but he hadn't managed to quite work up his old spikes. So it was roughly styled back, but most of what had been holding it there had come out over the course of the day, leaving him looking a bit worse for wear. It figured.

A figure appeared in Phoenix's peripheral vision, and he glanced over to see a waitress with a grilled chicken sandwich and a glass of grape juice on a tray, with a small smile on her face. "Order for you, sir."

"I'm sorry, I think you have the wrong table. I haven't ordered anything."

The waitress nodded back to the bar. "The older gentleman over at the bar sent it to you." Setting the dishes down, she just smiled and ambled off, leaving Phoenix to look back to the bar, trying to think of any 'older gentleman' that would send him food.

And while he didn't find anyone that matched that description, he did find someone with silver hair that with a small case of ignorance, could pass for a fit. Picking up the plate and glass, he made his way over to the bar.

"Older gentleman, hm?" Phoenix couldn't hide the amused smile from his lips.

The man at the bar scoffed. "Leave it to the inept waitress to immediately age me thirty years based on the color of my hair." A slight turn and steel grey eyes that Phoenix didn't think would ever lose that von Karma edge to them caught him breathless, the way they always could.

He forced himself to speak; one other thing that would never change about his friend was that if you couldn't stand on social protocol, you had no business talking to him. "This is the last place I expected to find you, Edgeworth."

The prosecutor, almost unrecognizable without the trademark suit and cravat, shrugged. "I too can enjoy a night of jazz, Wright." He gestured to a seat at the bar next to him. "Don't just stand there with your food. Sit. Eat."

"Yes, sir," Phoenix replied with a small smirk, sitting as he was told, and took a bite of the sandwich. He'd actually never eaten here before; the food was better than he'd expected. Why he'd expected less, however, was anyone's guess.

The silence between the two of them would have been unbearable had it not been for the musicians – and even then, it seemed to him like they weren't even playing. He kept waiting, waiting for his old friend to say something – anything – else. He shouldn't have cared; this wasn't the first time, or even the second that the two had been apart for one reason or another for some length of time. But perhaps it was because he'd been away from everything...everyone...that he clung to Edgeworth now.

At least, that's what he could try and convince himself of.

"I'd ask what you've been doing for the past few years, but I bet I could guess," Phoenix finally quipped, desperate to break this barrier.

Edgeworth let out a quick breath of air, the closest thing he had to a laugh on his good days. "And you, ever unpredictable." His gaze turned on the musicians as they held a grand pause, only to slowly ease their way back into the music. "I almost expected you to be up there."

"I never played terribly well," Phoenix brushed off, but a piece stayed nagging at the back of his mind. "How..." His voice failed him, and the prosecutor turned his eyes back to Wright.

"How what?"

Phoenix swallowed impulsively. "How did...how did you know? I never saw you there."

"Know what, Wright? I'm not a mind reader," he responded, his tone sounding so much like his adoptive sister.

Phoenix just glared at him in return. "You're also not stupid, Edgeworth. You know what I mean. How do you know I played piano? You never set foot in the Borscht Bowl Club."

"No, nor would I ever." Edgeworth leaned back, shifting his head just enough to pull his hair from his face without ever taking his eyes off of Phoenix's. The darker haired man shivered ever so slightly. Even out of the courtroom, the prosecutor could be all too intimidating.

...Yes, intimidating was a good word. Not a different one. He'd stay with that.

"So how did you know?"

"Wright, I am a highly respected prosecutor in this city. It wasn't terribly difficult to find you."

"You spied on me?"

Edgeworth's gaze narrowed. "I did no such thing. I..." He took a breath, and Phoenix could almost see the gears turning in his eyes. "I kept my ears open."

Phoenix went to respond, and then thought about that. "Wait..." Now Edgeworth turned his head away, tapping the bar in front of him as indication to the bartender. "Wait, Edgeworth... You were keeping an ear out for me. You..." He shook his head. "Why?"

"Is there a problem with my actions?" The chill he held in his voice so commonly in the courtroom was creeping into his speech now, and Phoenix knew to tread lightly.

"No...no, of course not." Phoenix held a breath, waiting until the right words came to him. "It just...surprises me."

That got the steel gaze to come back to him. "Why would it be surprising that someone would be interested in keeping track of whether you were dead or alive?"

"Not just anyone, Edgeworth." Phoenix set the half-eaten sandwich down – when he'd eaten it, he couldn't tell – and shifted just a bit closer to the other man. "You. You kept an eye out for me."

"Yes well, someone had to." There was the von Karma brush off, the one you usually got from the Perfect Prosecutor when she knew you were right but would never admit it. He could almost see Franziska in Edgeworth's posture.

Phoenix decided to let it drop. "How long have you been coming here?"

He'd lost Edgeworth for a moment with his change in topic, but the prosecutor recovered well – naturally. "I'd say a year or two. I haven't kept track."

Phoenix nodded. "Have you heard the band before? I'm not familiar with them."

"No. Why did you change the subject?" Edgeworth shot back, his tone terse.

Phoenix blinked. "Because you didn't seem to want to talk about it."

"If you know that I've been keeping tabs on you over the years, then you know that I'm aware of your disbarment. You haven't found any steady job since then, aside from your stint at that club, and now that your... daughter-" the word came awkwardly off of Edgeworth's lips, and Phoenix bit back a smirk- "has her own path with the Justice child, you're left on your own."

Phoenix just nodded, as Edgeworth stared at him intently. "Yeah, that sums it up pretty well. What's your point?"

"Wright, you're living on unemployment."

"Yes?"

The prosecutor looked like he was going to smack Phoenix in the head. "Why don't you do something about it?"

"I've tried." Now it was Phoenix's turn to morph into a more serious form of himself. "What have your tabs told you? Did they know that I went to the board today? Did they hear the laughter as I left the building? I'm a joke to them, Edgeworth. No matter how hard I've worked in the past, no matter what I do to make strides with something like the MASON System... I'm still that stupid lucky attorney that Mia Fey felt bad for." His voice caught just a hair on Mia's name; even all these years later, that memory stung.

"And did you apply?" It was as if Edgeworth hadn't heard a word Phoenix had said.

"No – weren't you listening? I got laughed out of the building."

The silver-haired man's voice was firm. "And that stopped you?" If nothing else, that sentence certainly stopped him. "Wright, just because they think you can't do it doesn't mean you can't."

Phoenix blinked a few times. "I..." He tilted his head. "I never said that I couldn't."

"But you walked away."

"They l-"

"Yes, they laughed at you. But tell me this, Wright: who cleared Vera Misham's name? Yes, Justice defended the case, but who truly put the pieces together? Who put Matt Engarde behind bars, despite every ounce of training saying you shouldn't? Who went against his very nature to determine who truly poisoned Diego Armando – and who tried to poison you? You won a case when you barely knew your name, for heaven's sake, and..." Edgeworth's voice faltered, ever so slightly. "You solved DL-6." Like a sledgehammer to the chest, Phoenix felt his breath leave him. That case wasn't one either of them wanted to think about again. "The list goes on, Wright, and you know it," Edgeworth finished.

"So what do you want me to do about it, Miles?" Phoenix's voice was tired. He rarely used Edgeworth's given name, especially in public, but he didn't care anymore. Tonight he couldn't be bothered with his friend's overly formal behaviour. He'd met him as Miles – and tonight Miles he was again.

"I want you to go back into that office tomorrow morning and fill out your application," was the simple response. "I want you to act like the defense attorney that Mia Fey saw promise in – the one she left her entire company to upon her death. Be the defense attorney that struck down Manfred von Karma – and his daughter – and his protegé." Those grey eyes never let on a moment of who he was actually talking about. "Be the lawyer that tracked me down in court."

I never told him that. Phoenix matched Edgeworth's gaze, the two of them staring each other down as they once did in the courtroom. "You know it's true, right? I..." Phoenix wanted so much to just look away, to give up on the sentence, but he wouldn't. "Back in school, when you convinced the kids that I didn't take your money. It's what made me want to be a defense attorney."

Without comment, Edgeworth just leaned forward and set a hand on Phoenix's shoulder. "Then your next move should be simple. You became an attorney because of me. You became as good as you are because of me." There was a beat of silence. "Now go back to the bar because of me. ...Go back for me. I can't keep prosecuting against these fools, Phoenix. The people need you to rise from the ashes again. They need you."

And maybe he dreamed it, but Phoenix could almost hear in his voice, see in his eyes, the rest of a sentence: I need you. He wanted to lean forward, to see if he could catch the steeled prosecutor off guard with a chaste kiss – but he couldn't. He'd never been able to.

"Tell me you'll do it, Phoenix." Miles had leaned far enough forward that if he focused, Phoenix could feel his friend's breath on his face – probably to get his attention, but that was beside the point.

"I..." The words caught in his throat. "I...sure, Miles. I'll go back tomorrow."

Before Phoenix could speak another syllable, the prosecutor had moved away from Phoenix and seemed to have entirely dismissed everything that had just happened. The former defense attorney was breathless. "Good. I would have been disappointed in you otherwise."

"How the...no. Why the hell do you do that?" Phoenix finally had to ask, rubbing the back of his head. Edgeworth's gaze came back up to match his, a faint flicker of what could have been amusement in the back of his expression.

"To watch your expression." The band finished their song and Edgeworth stood. "I'll see you after your paperwork is through."

And before he could ask how that would come to pass, the man was gone, leaving Phoenix with a half-eaten sandwich and the untouched glass of grape juice.

Damn it, Miles. Stop toying with me.