"My name is Apollo Justice and I'm fine!" Apollo shouted.

"What was that?" Trucy said.

"My name is Apollo Justice and I'm fine!" Apollo repeated, this time even louder.

"I can't hear you!" Trucy said.

"My name is Apollo Justice and I'm fine!" Apollo shouted at the top of his lungs.

"Okay, that one I heard!" Trucy said, rubbing her ears. "Not sure I'll be able to hear anything else ever again…"

"Objection!" Apollo shouted, his voice still booming. "You agreed to this, no complaining!"

The young, loud attorney and his magical assistant stood facing each other in the defendant's lobby. Apollo had somehow slept in that morning, waking up at five in the morning as opposed to three, so he hadn't had time to complete his Chords of Steel training beforehand.

"How long does Chords of Steel training take you in the morning anyway?" Trucy said.

"As long as it takes!" Apollo declared proudly, pumping his fists.

"Do you just scream that same phrase over and over again for hours?" Trucy said.

"No, I switch it up sometimes, especially before a trial," Apollo said. "Like shouting 'objection' or 'hold it', stuff like that. Or I might use someone else's name."

"Like whose?" Trucy said.

Apollo cleared this throat, which was beginning to feel a bit dry. "Your name is Trucy Wright and you're fine!"

"Am I?" Trucy shouted back, back in the game.

"Your name is Trucy Wright and you're fine!" Apollo shouted, slightly louder.

"Yes I am! And who else is fine?" Trucy exclaimed.

"My client's name is Kay Faraday and she's fine!" Apollo shouted.

"I don't believe you!" Trucy said; her hands balled into fists.

"My client's name is Kay Faraday and she's fine!" Apollo shouted once again.

"I don't think the rest of the courthouse heard that!" Trucy said.

"My client's name is Kay Faraday and she's fine!" Apollo shouted, feeling his vocal chords reach a new level of volume.

"Thanks!" Kay shouted behind him.

Apollo jumped back and turned around. His client stood behind him, her hands behind her back.

"Oh, didn't hear you come in!" Apollo shouted, still in Chords of Steel mode.

"I wonder why!" Kay shouted back.

"Nice try, but you'll have to be louder if you want Chords of Steel!" Apollo shouted.

"Thanks, but I'm fine!" Kay shouted, grinning impishly.

"Yes you are!" Apollo shouted.

"Hehehe! You're pretty confident today," Kay said.

"You'll never guess what we found!" Trucy said. "We have evidence that Ship Enterprises was part of the drug dealing!"

"… You what?" Kay said, her eyes widening.

"I said we have evidence that incriminates that company you've been after!" Trucy said, jumping up and down with excitement. "Isn't that great?"

"Oh my goodness…" Kay murmured. Slowly, the corners of her face lifted into a grin befitting the Cheshire Cat. "That's incredible! How did you do that?"

Sharing their client's excitement, Apollo and Trucy retold the story of how they had gotten into Ship Enterprises and found Necoephedrine in the warehouse.

"That's amazing!" Kay said. "And all of it was legal?"

Apollo nodded his head, grinning. "Yep! This evidence is one hundred percent legal."

"Holy crow, guys!" Kay said. Without warning she wrapped her arms around the two of them and pulled them into a hug. "Arigato!"

"Uh… you're welcome?" Apollo said, awkwardly patting her on the back. He had never been quite sure what to do in a group hug.

"Yes! Thank you!" Kay said, letting go and taking a step back. Her smile never wavered.

"Now all we have to do is connect this case to that company and we're set!" Trucy said.

Apollo nodded his head, grinning. "That reminds me, I need to ask you a couple questions about that."

"Ask away!" Kay said.

"Well, do you know anything about a gang called the Rivale Family?" Apollo said.

"Yeah, they were the lead that brought my attention the Ship Enterprises," Kay said.

"Then does the name 'Lucy Rivale' ring a bell?" Apollo said.

"I'm afraid I don't know any of their names, I was more focused on what they were doing than who they were," Kay said, arms crossed. "But if I saw her I might recognize her."

"I have an entire file on her, actually," Apollo said, presenting the profile Maria had given him. He opened it to the first page. "Her name is Lucy, she's a young assassin in the family. According to this her weapon of choice is knives, and well… frankly she's kind of sadistic."

"Sounds like one bad apple," Kay said.

"Pretty much. So does she look familiar at all?" Apollo said.

Kay looked at the open page in the attorney's hand, grazing through the contents. Her eyes stopped when she saw the photo in the top left corner.

"So?" Trucy said.

"Oh yeah, I know this girl," Kay said.

"Interesting…" Apollo said.

"Do you think she has something to do with this? I mean she was arrested," Kay said.

"How did you know that?" Trucy said.

"Well… I may or may not have, you know, knocked her unconscious before," Kay said.

"You what now?" Apollo said.

"In my defense, it's not like she was just standing there. She kind of had a knife to Ms. Coldstare's throat…" Kay said, pressing her fingers together.

"… I'm going to need a little more context here," Apollo said.

"See, I was investigating. Well, I guess followed the Rivales around would be a little more accurate," Kay said. "Ms. Coldstare was investigating too, then… problems happened."

"What happened?" Trucy said.

"I'm not sure exactly, we weren't exactly working together. Suddenly I heard screaming, then next thing I know I see her and Mr. Edgeworth running after a gang member."

"Wait, Mr. Edgeworth was there too?" Apollo said.

"Don't look at me, I'm just telling you what I know," Kay said, shrugging her shoulders. "Anyway, I went after them to see if I could help…"

Kay relayed the rest of story in as much detail as she could, describing how Maria had been dragged into an alleyway and Miles getting caught between a rock and hard place. She then recalled her intervention, from knocking out the girl to chasing off the other guy.

"I see…" Apollo said, pressing his finger against his forehead. Call me crazy, but something tells me this is important. Definitely filing that away for later.

"Wow, Ms. Coldstare never mentioned that," Trucy said.

"Hehe. If she's anything like Mr. Edgeworth, she's not going to tell you something about herself without being specifically asked," Kay said, her shoulders bouncing as she spoke.

Still, seems like something one would bring up at some point. You know, something like "Hey, guys, you'll never believe what happened to me!" It wouldn't be that hard.

Just then, there was a knock on the door. The door swung open and a large man bolted into the lobby.

"Hey, pal! I got the results on that bullet!" Gumshoe said, smiling proudly.

"Oh yeah, thank you so much!" Apollo said. I had completely forgotten about that…

"So what did they find?" Trucy said, bouncing on her heels.

"It's just like we thought, this bullet was fired from the same one that was used against Mr. Edgeworth!" Gumshoe said. "Hang on. I've got it with me."

He dug through one of the large pockets in his ragged coat and pulled out a plastic bag with a small bullet inside. Apollo carefully took the bag and examined the bullet.

"This should be everything I need…" Apollo murmured to himself.

"Wow, Gummy!" Kay said. "That's really impressive!"

"Aw, it was nothing really," Gumshoe said, blushing slightly. "Good luck in there, you know I'm rooting for you guys!"

"Thanks!" Kay said, beaming.

A court bailiff opened the door and poked his head in. "Mr. Justice, the trial will begin soon. Ms. Faraday, come with me."

"Guess this is it," Kay said. "Good luck, guys."

"Thanks," Apollo said. "Don't worry, this is going to end today. In our favor."

"We'll be fine?" Kay said.

"Now you're catching on."


A few minutes later, everyone was in the courtroom. The civilians that made up the gallery talked among themselves, each voices melding together so that Apollo couldn't actually make out a single word being spoken from his place behind the defense bench. Across from him was Klavier, snapping to a beat in his head. How can he tune all this noise out? Or is there some kind of rhythm in all this chattering that I'm not hearing?

The judge's gavel was brought down on the wooden podium, cutting through the noise in an instant. Dressed in his usual black robes, the judge surveyed the entire courtroom from his seat as the faint traces of individual voices faded away.

He cleared his throat. "Ahem. Court is back in session for the trial of Ms. Kay Faraday. I believe we left off with a most troublesome contradiction between testimonies."

"Ja, Herr Judge," Klavier said. "The defendant claimed the shooter was a man with black hair, whereas the victim claimed his hair was white. These descriptions were about as opposite as they come."

"I assume you investigated this matter?" the judge said.

"Of course, Your Honor," Klavier said. "The investigative team had the brilliant insight to check the crime scene for footprints. A detective on a different team just happened to have the materials needed and lent them to us. The results were interesting, to say at the least."

"And what were the results?" the judge said.

"Well, as expected, the victim's footprints were discovered along with the defendant's," Klavier said. "However… a third set was also uncovered."

"Oh my! Is that so?" the judge said, eyes wide with surprise.

The distant sounds of voices from the gallery began to rise again.

"I say this to save the defense the trouble of announcing it, as I suspect he already unearthed this little fact," Klavier said.

Apollo only smiled.

"Anyway, we had the layout of the crime scene imprint with where the footprints were found," Klavier said, presenting a gray and white sheet of paper. "This is only an approximation, of course, as it would've been too time consuming to search for and plot out every individual print."

Apollo took the new map and examined it. A line of blue dots, meant to represent the victim's shoeprints, ran up from the bottom of the map and stopped in the center of the clearing. A line of red dots, representing defendant's movements, ran from the north of the clearing to the left hand side of the victim. Finally, a green dotted line representing where the witness walked ran along the top of the page to the right hand side of the victim. Looks like a simplified version of our findings with Little Thief. That's good to know.

"The results could not be clearer, ja? There was a third person that day," Klavier said. "However, despite this fact, the prosecution still has every reason to suspect the defendant."

"And why is that?" the judge said. "Furthermore, whose footprints were they?"

"We believe they belong to a police officer by the name of Laine Rover," Klavier said.

"Laine Rover? Isn't he the officer who was arrested for murder?" the judge said.

"Sharp observation, Herr Judge," Klavier said.

"How can you be sure those shoes belong to that man?" the judge said.

"Simply, really. The timing," Klavier said. "You can scientifically estimate how long a shoeprint has been there with this method the police used. Only the three sets I've mention match up with the day of the crime. And as we all know, the park had been closed that day. So there's no confusing it."

"I see… Science really has moved forward since I was a young man," the judge said.

"Now I agree that it's certainly suspicious to see the shoe prints of a man already being accused of murder, but there is another explanation," Klavier said.

"And what would that be?" Apollo said.

"I think it would be best to have the man himself explain," Klavier said. "That way this matter will be settles once and for all, ja?"

"That sounds reasonable, I suppose. Bring him to the stand," the judge said.

"Polly, what's your plan here?" Trucy said.

"I'm honestly not sure. I knew this was coming but…" Apollo trailed off.

"This guy is Daddy's client, we can't suspect someone represented by our agency," Trucy said, looking down at the floor.

"… It doesn't matter," Apollo said. "I'm going to treat this man like every other witness. I'm not sure what to make of this yet, and I'm not going to make any assumptions until I have all the facts. If Kay's not guilty, the facts will show as much. If Mr. Rover's innocent too, then the facts will show that too."

"I guess you're right," Trucy said, smiling.

A man wearing a police uniform walked up to the witness stand. His gait was confident yet reserved, taking slow, careful steps. He stopped when he reached the stand, the waist down blocked from sight by the polished wood. His eyes gazed at the courtroom from behind locks of blonde hair, his mouth covered by face mask. There was something eerie about his presence, Apollo had to admit. The shadows cast over his face by his hair gave him an unsettling appearance.

"Achoo!" Laine sneezed, instinctively covering his mouth despite the mask. "Achoo! Achoo!"

The officer bent forward with every sneeze, apparently a habit of his. He rubbed the bridge of his nose. "Sorry, I have a cold."

"Yes, I remember. Bless you, Mr. Rover," the judge said, nodding his head.

"Thank you," Laine said. He brushed his bangs out of his face, revealing the brown irises of his eyes. His entire image suddenly looked much brighter and friendly. There was a smile in his eyes, and most likely behind the face mask, as he spoke. "I take it you all know who I am."

"Yes, this certainly isn't the first time I've seen you recently," the judge said grimly. "But for the sake of formality, state your name and occupation."

"Oh, right, sure," Laine said. "Well, they call me Laine Rover. I work as a police officer…"

"Are you feeling alright, Mr. Rover?" Apollo said.

"Hm? Yeah, it's just… I work as a police officer. You know, for now," Laine said, placing a hand where his gun holster usually was. "I guess I can't worry about that right now though. You need me to testify, right?"

"Indeed. Your shoeprints were uncovered at the scene of the murder," the judge said. "I mean the attempted murder! I must say, it's hard to keep track of two trials at once…"

"Don't worry about it, Your Honor. The prosecutor filled me already," Laine said.

"Excellent. Begin your testimony," the judge said.

Testimony

I should probably apologize for all this confusion I caused.

You see, I walk through People Park pretty often. It's a good way to stretch my legs.

Sometimes I like to go off the path though and explore a bit. I do that a lot, actually.

So it makes sense that my shoeprints would be in a place like a clearing.

But it's not as if I was there the day of the crime.

"So this was all merely a coincidence, you say?" the judge said.

"Yes, and again I'm sorry about all this," Laine said. "Seems like I've been slipping up a lot lately…"

"It happens to the best of us," the judge said. "Now then, Mr. Justice, I take it you'd like to cross examine the witness?"

Apollo stared into space, a blank expression on his face.

The judge smacked his gavel. "Mr. Justice!"

"I'm fine!" Apollo exclaimed, jumping back. "I- Yes, Your Honor. I'd like to cross-examine the witness."

"Very well, go ahead," the judge said.

"Polly, what was that?" Trucy said, looking at her partner with concern in her eyes.

"It was… nothing," Apollo said. "Just… I don't get it. You see the problem with what he just said, don't you?"

"Yeah, I did," Trucy said, looking down at her fingers.

Apollo sighed. Sorry, Mr. Wright. I'm going to make your job a lot harder.


Welp, that's the chapter! Poor Laine, he simply can't do anything right. He's just misunderstood, that's all. I swear he's a nice guy.

… Or is he? ;D

You may have noticed that it's not Friday yet. Well, I've decided I'm going to ramp up production for the next few weeks. So except two chapters a week from now on! My goal is to finish this story before the middle of July, because I'll be going away and won't be able to write or even get on the Internet for a whole week. I figured more frequent updates was preferable to missing one. ^^

You know what I'm going to say. Tell me your thoughts! :D