It was the most obvious mark of his sever-year prison stay. A physical, tangible testament to each day spent in the clink. It was time to be rid of it.
Prosecutor Simon Blackquill held his massive ponytail in his left hand and turned his head in order to examine it in the mirror in front of him. Every day for the past seven years of his life, he'd adjusted the hair elastic slightly, returning it to the position that would mark the original length of his hair as it was before his incarceration. Over the years, his ponytail had grown into a massive black mop at the back of his head. He'd grown accustomed to it, much as he'd grown accustomed to life in the clink. He'd never expected for anything but death to free him from his chains, and hadn't really thought about his hair until now.
He intended to cut it. Not only would this serve as a significant step forward, to help him move on from seven years of life in prison, his unruly mane would undoubtedly prove to be a nuisance in the future if he were keep it. It was impractical, unwieldy, and no longer served a purpose.
The act of cutting it was fairly simple. He held the ponytail away from him with his left hand and cut it above the band in a single bladeless slice with his right.
He held it in his hands, surprised by its weight, both physical and symbolic. Now that he saw it in front of him, the mass of hair was larger and denser than he'd assumed. He stood there for a moment and examined it.
He had no idea what to do with it.
As he stood there thinking, he heard a knock on the door, so he set the cut hair down on a table on his way to answer it.
Athena was at the door.
"Good morning, Simon," she said with her usual cheer, "I see you cut your hair."
"I did," he answered plainly. "Good morning, Athena."
Despite the prosecutor's flat expression, Athena was glad to hear that Simon's voice had lost much of the tension it held in the courtroom. If she wasn't mistaken, she was quite certain she heard a bit of pride as well when he affirmed that he did cut his hair.
"How are you?" she asked. A simple question, but they both knew that she was listening for more than just the answer.
His answer was brief and honest: "Better."
Athena smiled. Better was good. Though it meant that he wasn't completely fine yet, it would have been unreasonable to expect him to be, and if he had lied for her sake, she'd have noticed that how he felt wasn't matching up with words.
After a moment's pause, the prosecutor added a "Would you like to come in?" and Athena accepted the invitation.
She entered and the two conversed for a while. It was clear to Athena that Simon wasn't yet completely comfortable with the entire situation, but was more pleased to see her than he'd expressed. Athena ensured that the conversation strayed away from topics he wasn't quite ready to discuss, listening carefully to his voice for any tremors or cues that the conversation was beginning to head somewhere it shouldn't.
Athena's visit was unexpected and Blackquill was still unused to how much things had changed, especially Athena. Seven years in the clink had prevented him from experiencing the world's changes gradually, and the transition from incarceration to freedom made for a drastic change in itself.
Much of it was unexpected. Unexpected... but welcome.
Eventually, Athena left and they bid their farewells cordially.
It was not until significantly later that day that Prosecutor Blackquill noticed that the ponytail had gone missing sometime during their conversation, and it was not until later that week he discovered that Taka had taken it and used it as nesting material.
Blackquill was momentarily amused, then moved on with his life because what happened to the mess of hair after he cut it was really of no consequence.
Author's Note: This was written primarily for some people I RP with on Google Plus. It was supposed to be a quick thing to sort of link my fanfiction account to the Ace Attorney fandom.
I'm not entirely satisfied with it. It's not my best work and the ending was rushed, but after I'd made a (fairly poorly thought out) decision involving ensure the piece would be finished, I'd had to either sacrifice quality or resolve. So I chose to finish the piece.
I hope to have a good Ace Attorney fanfic written eventually, and I'm not going to force myself to write it like I did with this one.