If Edgeworth, up to this point, has been stupid enough to keep living on the San Andreas Fault, it's no surprise that he keeps having to experience a few more earthquakes. Trying to keep my chapters short.

Chapter Two – The Case File

The case had started out so normally: it was a typical Miles Edgeworth one-day trial; or so it had seemed. The defendant, a real estate agent by the name of Mike Carlson, had been accused of murdering his wife. Edgeworth had calmly watched as Derrick Jones, the defense attorney, bungled Gumshoe's testimony to the point of idiocy, accidentally letting the detective introduce every piece of incriminating evidence against his client. For me, it had been a painful reminder of my first few cross-examinations.

Then, all of a sudden, I'd been suddenly called as a material witness by the defense. I had represented Carlson's wife Edith, the victim, in a grand larceny trial only a week before her murder, and during Gumshoe's testimony, Jones literally seemed to make up an excuse about needing me present to talk about Carlson's whereabouts on the night of the crime.

It had been the most embarrassing testimony of my life: Edith had, in fact, called me on the day of her murder and had insisted that I come over to look at her will. So I'd been forced to testify that Carlson, along with Edith's daughter from a previous marriage, Nina, had allegedly been away camping all that day and evening. It was his primary alibi, and it had been questionable before: but now it started to look almost unshakeable.

In the space of ten minutes, the tables had completely turned. Jones had produced a cabin rental slip, signed once the morning of the murder and once again the day after by Carlson, and had called up his defendant as a witness. Carlson had then proceeded to testify that he and Nina had gotten into a fight and she had called for a taxi to take her home. The owner of the camping grounds had appeared, volunteering information that Carlson had arrived that evening with a young girl, and had left in the morning alone. All of a sudden the blame for the murder was directly on her thin shoulders.

I'd watched on, Edgeworth quite obviously courting an aneurysm at the prosecutor's table, as the judge had called Nina to the stand. She'd made a lousy impression on the judge and the spectators, sullen and tight-lipped with black clothing, too many piercings, and bright green hair. But once the formal accusation of murder had spilled from Jones's lips, I suddenly knew he'd planned the whole thing, all along. Nina's eyes, rimmed in heavy black mascara, were abruptly wide, stricken, filling with tears in a hauntingly familiar way. And for the first time I could remember, Edgeworth had looked up from the prosecutor's bench, face desperate and haunted, to lock eyes with me.

Nina hadn't done it any more than I had: I only needed to look at her face to know it. On top of that, she had a relatively solid alibi. But suddenly all of the evidence was ranged against her, made to look as if she'd deliberately planted it. Needling, pushing, probing, Jones managed to use all of my own best techniques in court, and tease out the sordid history between Nina and Edith, who was, in fact, not Nina's mother but her stepmother. Edith's first husband had Nina with *his* first wife before their, Edith and Mike's, marriage, and Nina had never gotten along with Edith, even before Nina's father died and Edith had remarried.

Murmuring stole through the courtroom as they realized that Edith and Mike Carlson were both Nina's step-parents. That murmur rose to loud, angry buzzing as they came to the further conclusion that the ungrateful, sociopathic Nina was the killer, fueled by the desperation to get her hands on her real father's money, which Edith had inherited after his death. It was a nightmare.

X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X-X

Now Edgeworth had only one option left. Miraculously obtaining an extra day from the judge for investigation, he'd interviewed Nina at length in the detention center, and had spent hours poring over the case files. He had slept only two hours, by my count, since court had last let out, and both of them had been on the sofa in his office, while I paged through the case files highlighting things for him. There was only one way to prove, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that Nina was not the killer, and that Carlson was. The evidence was there. Edgeworth was already reasonably sure that he could break the cabin owner's testimony, that he was lying and had been bribed. But the murder still required motive. And the only person who would know the motive... was Edith Carlson.

"Did... did the channeling go well?" I asked, feeling almost timid, as we waited for Maya to return.

"Yes," Edgeworth said, voice forcedly impassive now. "By this time tomorrow, Maya will have proved irrevocably that spirit channeling is a reliable form of court witness. If, that is, she's ever called to the stand." He looked as if neither option pleased him.

Just looking at him made me feel a little ill myself. The last time a spirit channeler had actually been called to the stand by the prosecution was almost two decades ago: the DL-6 case. Sure, spirit channeling had been called into the limelight during California vs. Hawthorne, but that had been trial incidence. No one had known that Iris, called to the stand, had actually been Maya in the form of Dahlia Hawthorne. And the case had ended disastrously, throwing the prosecutor's offices into a complete scramble for months. Like DL-6 itself, any reference to that case was almost always rewarded with a swift, disapproving change of subject.

I couldn't even imagine, then, how Edgeworth must be feeling. Years before he'd been forced to watch Misty Fey channel the spirit of his own father, who subsequently provided inaccurate testimony... and now Misty's daughter was performing the same service. Except this time, Edgeworth would have no mistakes made. Despite the fact that he was the prosecutor for the case, the rest of this trial for him would be an all-out defense of Nina Carlson.

"Yes. Edith made it quite clear," he said, interrupting my thoughts. "She can describe the murder in a way... well, in a way only the victim could provide. Beyond that, she can describe her husband's motive. The problem is getting reasonable doubt thrown into Nina's testimony so that I can call Maya to the stand." He glanced sideways at me, a tired, half-smile appearing. It was almost more sad than if he hadn't smiled. "But you know that, Wright."

"Yes." Maya was returning. Obviously she'd made an effort to smarten up: she'd scrubbed her cheeks so that they glowed an energetic pink. I felt a sudden helplessness, and not a little guilt: I should have anticipated Jones's move, should have known that he would twist my testimony against Nina. "Edgeworth, you know... if there's anything I can help with, just say it. I can help you look over case files again tonight."

"No," he said, as Maya rejoined us. "I hate to say this, Wright, but... you've got your own case tomorrow, remember? And you really can't be seen in my office again, not unless we want there to be talk of you fixing my witness. She's your assistant, after all. Your hands are tied."

"Well, I hope he can free them long enough to pull out his wallet," said Maya, far too cheerfully. But as she grinned at me, I saw some of the tiredness melting away, and a real spark light in her eyes. "I'm absolutely starving, Nick. Can we just go to the pizza parlor? It's so much closer than anything fancy."

I glanced over at Edgeworth, suppressing a sudden smile. He, too, looked amused. Maya never failed to comment that no matter where we ate, she always liked the food better, be it a fast-food burger or truffled quail, if it were closer to our current location. "That's all right with me."

"Let's just go before your stomach implodes," I said, with a heavy mock-sigh. Even if Maya and Edgeworth had to talk shop, so to speak, over dinner, all of our moods would be improved by the presence of a large anchovy pizza. Edgeworth's finicky dining preferences notwithstanding, he did occasionally seem to enjoy the casual comfort that came from sharing a booth at DiPietro's.

I was glad he was coming for another reason. He'd only just been released from the hospital a bare month ago - that wretched case of appendicitis had kept him there for almost two weeks - and I was worried that Edgeworth would run himself down. This case was really tearing him apart. What bothered me even more was that even Maya was actively worried about him. Most of the time her volubility just spilled out inadvertently, cheering everyone up without even an effort. But last night she'd expressed something completely different. "The last thing Mr. Edgeworth needs," she'd said furiously, doing a fantastic impression of an inflated blowfish, "is a messy trial like this. And poor Nina! He must be worried sick about her now! I could just kick that stupid Jones in the knees for pulling this trick!" I couldn't much disagree with that.

A bright dinging noise arrested my attention, and as I looked up, my stomach suddenly sank. Skipping ahead, Maya had headed straight for the elevators. My feet hesitated for a moment, trying to carry me in the direction of the stairs. I glanced at Edgeworth: his face betrayed nothing, and before Maya had even turned around from the doors, he'd adjusted his step to make it look like he'd been following her the whole time.

Well, if he was set on putting himself through it, there was nothing I could do to stop him. Strange: how whenever he and I went somewhere alone, it was taken for granted that we would walk however many flights of stairs were required. But like me, he would dissemble in any fashion for Maya's sake.

Yet another reason for me to stop being weak and just tell her already.