Author's Note: This... was supposed to be up a lot sooner. And I am supposed to be writing more of these. As it is, I've been so crunched for time on these assignments that I barely have time to write anything, much less put effort into a fanfic. Hopefully, though, I'll be able to do more with them in the coming weeks!

Proofreading Magic

POV: Apollo Justice

Prompt: Language

Context: Apollo is working on paperwork, only to be interrupted with a favor for Trucy.

Notes: Writing about language is hard. It's such a vague prompt that I didn't even know what to do with it. So here's my attempt.

"Hey, Polly." My magician friend bounced up to me, a sheet of paper in her hand that was the same sky blue as her top hat and cape.

"Hi, Trucy," I responded. "What do you need?"

"Could you pleeeeease proofread my new flier for the magic show?" She grinned, somehow managing to give me puppy dog eyes along with her smile, which I hadn't realized was possible. Then again, it's Trucy. Anything is possible with her.

I looked at the tower of paperwork next to me, and almost said no, but another glance at her face made me crumble. "Alright. Hand it over."

Her eyes smiled, now, too. "Thanks, Polly!"

"Yup." I read through the flier carefully, marking things here and there. She waited patiently, bouncing on the balls of her feet. "Okay, here you go." I smiled as she looked it over. "It looks neat, but you should probably work on your spelling."

"Yeah...I guess you're right. I even misspelled 'Troupe Gramarye!'" Her fist tapped the brim of her hat as she stuck her tongue out slightly.

"I think people would be disappointed if they came to watch a 'troop' of soldiers and only found some magicians." I smirked.

After giving me a pointed look, she sighed. "Why is it even spelled like that, anyway? It doesn't make any sense!"

"English is a pretty crazy language," I said. "I talked to Machi they other day; they're teaching him in prison, and he says he's having trouble."

"Well, yeah! I have trouble with it still, and I've been learning it for sixteen years!"

"Heh, clearly."

She frowned, hands on her hips. "Hey, it wasn't that bad!"

"...Trucy, you spelled 'magic' with an 'x' ."

"...Okay, maybe it was that bad." She finally just put the paper on my desk - or, rather, the mess that was covering my desk - and flopped onto the arm of my chair. "Really, though, why does our language have to be so messed up?!"

I sighed, holding her shoulder to try and stop her fidgeting. It didn't work, and the chair wobbled around as I said, "You didn't let me finish earlier. Machi also says that Borginian is harder, though. It's like Japanese, where each symbol stands for a word, but their grammar is really complex and doesn't have much structure. Plus, the pronunciations are just as wild and unpredictable as they are in English. He tried to teach me even a little bit, and I couldn't make it past 'I'm Apollo Justice.'"

"Wow. Maybe our language isn't as bad as I thought." She shifted one last time, before saying, "Hey, Polly. Wanna see a new trick?"

I shrugged. "Sure."

"Yay!"

She had a gleam in her eye that I recognized, so I added, "As long as it's not dangerous, and doesn't involve weapons, fire, or public humiliation."

"Don't worry! I promise it won't be bad." Her grin was a little too wide, but I leaned back in my chair and waited, pushing back the wave of dread.

"Here you go!" She handed me the flier again, this time folded in half.

"Is that it?"

"Yup! Look at it!" She finally got to the point where she couldn't contain her energy any longer, and stood up so she could bounce on the balls of her feet.

I opened the page, which looked perfectly normal. "There's nothing here."

She looked at me, hands on her hips again. "Polly! That's the point!"

It hit me then, like a ton of bricks. "Wait, all the spelling is fixed!" And I call myself a lawyer…

"Yeah! Isn't it cool!"

"Heh, nice." I smiled. After another moment, though, the implications caught up with me. "Hey, you had everything spelled right all along, didn't you?!"

"Well, I did go and ask Daddy to read it first, if that's what you mean. He helped me with most of the problems."

I flopped. "So you just wasted a half hour of the time I could have used to finish this paperwork?"

"Yup!" How can she smile so innocently even now?

I sighed. "Guess what you're going to be doing?"

And that's how Trucy spent the next hour writing "Apollo Justice" about 200 times.