March 4
District Courthouse
Defendant Lobby No. 2
9:45 AM
The next morning brought with it the nerve-wracking promise of the trial's beginning. I couldn't seem to banish my nerves no matter how hard I tried, and it felt like my body was trying to fight against the fact that I had to stay and stand in court. I had an awful feeling about what was to come next, and while I knew that this was primarily caused by nerves, that still led to quite a bit of spiraled thinking that made me want to do nothing more than pace around the lobby.
Of course, I stayed glued to the spot to the best of my ability, desperate to not show everyone that I was so nervous. We had to get into the courtroom soon, after all, and I didn't want to rub off on the others just because I was freaked out. If all went well, none of them would notice the way that Widget was betraying my true emotions, and I would be able to try and stay as quiet as possible about the fact that I wanted to scream into pillow a time or two before the trial kicked off.
Unfortunately, such a thing did not go unnoticed, and Apollo looked up at me with a small frown. "Athena? Are you alright? You look pretty nervous right now," he pointed out, and I knew that I wasn't going to be able to get away from his scrutinizing gaze no matter how hard I tried.
"I'm fine!" I exclaimed, sounding more like Apollo than myself for a few precious seconds. I didn't know how he could put on a mask of confidence in such a way, but I knew that in that moment, I would have given anything to have something like that on my side.
Apollo didn't seem to want to push it, and even if he did want to talk about it, his attention was pulled away from me when Trucy next spoke. "We did a lot to find out more about the case," she told Apollo. "The prosecutor seems to want to work with us to find the truth behind what happened at the time of the murder too."
Apollo crossed his arms as he moved his focus in her direction. "I sort of picked up on that to... She interrogated me yesterday, and I have to admit that she's a lot nicer than just about every other prosecutor that I've ever met," he told us.
"Aside from Prosecutor Gavin, you mean," Trucy taunted, pressing one hand to the brim of her hat as she winked in his direction. "I know that you two get along a lot better than you want the rest of us to believe."
Apollo's face flushed at Trucy's blatant taunting, but he didn't give her the dignity of being able to see just how embarrassed he was. Instead, he simply raised one hand to his face and coughed until it seemed as if the action was somewhat natural. Well, if I was being honest, it came off as a pathetic excuse for what he thought would take the heat off him, but it came up pathetically short, and I was sure that he knew it too.
"Prosecutor Lin seemed to be honest when we spoke with her yesterday about what we knew about the case," Mr. Wright interjected as a way of shifting the attention away from Apollo and his flustered demeanor. "I don't think that she had much of a reason to lie to us about that."
"And if she was lying, we would have noticed it anyway," Trucy finished for him. "That means that we'll be able to count on her to at least some degree when the trial goes into session."
"If I'm being honest, I still have to wonder what it is that we're going to see from her during this trial," I commented, fiddling absentmindedly with my moon earring. "It's not that I don't have faith that she'll stand by us when push comes to shove... I could tell that she was being genuine when we were talking to her. I just have to ask... Why? No prosecutor has ever been that upfront with us before."
"I couldn't tell you," Mr. Wright said with a shake of his head. "All we can do is press on with the case for now. Any questions that we might have regarding Prosecutor Lin's odd behavior are going to have to wait until after this trial has been taken care of. After all, we have to find the truth as soon as possible if we want to free Apollo from the detention center, and I know confidently that we do want to accomplish that much."
"I should hope so," Apollo muttered, a frown appearing on his face alongside a halfway exasperated expression. "The last thing that I want is my own defense team trying to sabotage me. Is that even legal?"
"No," Mr. Wright answered all too quickly, and I found myself curious as to what prompted such a sudden response. I raised an eyebrow in his direction, and Trucy offered me a loose smile that I assumed meant that I should ask about this situation after the trial had been taken care of and Apollo had been brought back to us in full. It would be a nice story to share over a victory meal, I was sure.
Of course, that meant that we had to win first, and I knew that was much easier said than done. First, we had to see what this trial was going to have in store for us, and there were still quite a few questions I had, such as why the cabinet at the scene of the crime was closed and then seemed to open randomly despite the fact that nobody could have possibly interfered with it during the timeframe where the shift took place. We were going to have to talk to Prosecutor Gavin and Simon too since they were inevitably going to wind up on the witness stand. In other words, there was a lot that we had yet to work through before we could consider this case wrapped up and in the past.
"Defense! It's time to enter the courtroom!"
The loud cry of the bailiff near the door made me jump, and I pressed one hand against my chest to try and mitigate the way that my heart was screaming inside my ribcage. My sensitive ears couldn't take too much of that, and it certainly felt like I was being punished even though I knew better than to believe that fully. Still, I couldn't let that get to me given the condition of the case, so I turned my gaze in the direction of my coworkers and offered them a smile that I hoped looked a lot more genuine than the way that I felt. "I guess that's our cue, huh?" I questioned, doing my best to come off as casual and conversational despite the way that I felt like something inside of my brain was going to explode with the rest of my body soon to follow.
"Good luck in there," Apollo said as he started to walk toward the courtroom. He offered a nervous chuckle before he punched his fist into his other palm that was waiting for the contact. "We're the Wright Anything Agency, and we're going to be fine!"
I pretended to not notice the nervous waver to his voice as I parroted the gesture to his retreating back. I didn't know what was going to happen during this trial, but I was confident that we were going to have to do everything in our power if we wanted to free Apollo from suspicion. He was counting on us, and I wasn't about to let him down!
March 4
District Courthouse
Courtroom No. 2
10:00 AM
The inside of the courtroom was exactly what I expected to find. In other words, there were people chatting from in the gallery, clearly unaware of the way that my stomach was doing flips in my stomach. I knew that we were going to find a way to save Apollo. That much I was confident of no matter what came next. However, I was still nervous as could be about how we were going to get there, and this trial was the first step whether I liked it or not.
The judge hit his gavel down after a few moments, clearing his throat to get the attention of the people of the gallery. "Court is now in session for the trial of..." His eyes narrowed as he looked down at the page before him with the details of the case written on it, and he seemed to reel backward as soon as he registered what he was reading. "Apollo Justice!"
"That would be correct, Your Honor," I told him carefully. I couldn't blame him for being surprised; I probably would have been too. In fact, there were some that could argue that I was still feeling the lingering traces of surprise from Apollo's arrest even after a day of investigation; those people were most certainly correct, and I wasn't going to try and say otherwise. They had a point, and I couldn't deny that, not that I even had the energy to try given the fact that there was enough stress on my shoulders as it was.
"I see," the judge said simply, doing his best to shove his shock aside as he concentrated on the subject at hand once again. "Are the defense and prosecution ready?"
Despite the way that every ounce of my being objected to such a statement, I nodded in his direction. "The defense is ready," I replied even though it was far from being true if I was being truthful with myself. Widget seemed ready to say that I was a liar, so I simply raised one hand over my necklace to cover up the speaker before it could chirp out anything that I didn't agree with others hearing. Sure enough, I heard motion against the speaker to represent a suppressed sound, a sure signal that I had made the right call.
Across the courtroom, Prosecutor Lin was standing exactly where I would have expected her to be. She was still the pinnacle of grace and confidence, the smile on her face so perfectly put together that it almost didn't seem real. Everything about her seemed to make so much sense in all the ways that I felt like I was going to explode. "The prosecution is ready, Your Honor," Prosecutor Lin declared with a light smile.
"Good," the judge said with a nod, seemingly having gathered his bearings since the shock of realizing Apollo was the defendant. "Go on and offer your opening statement, prosecution."
Prosecutor Lin reached for a piece of paper from the podium before her, reading off it effortlessly a moment later. "The crime took place yesterday at the Prosecutor's Office. A murder was committed, and the victim was one Huber Turner, a prosecutor. Well, if you want to get technical, he was a former prosecutor, having been removed from his position a few days before he was killed. He was found dead in his office, having been stabbed in the neck with a small knife on top of being covered in bruises."
Prosecutor Lin held up a picture a moment later that showed the scene of the crime as of the time of the police's discovery. "The defendant was found here when the witnesses first stumbled upon the area. He was unconscious and was removed from the scene before this picture was taken, but the fact remains that he was present. Furthermore, all of the other people who were in the Prosecutor's Office at the time of the murder have an alibi, all of them being in meetings with one another. He is the only one who didn't have someone to cover for him," she continued to say. "Plus, he has a motive, and he and the victim didn't get along while the latter was still alive due to Prosecutor Turner's habits of forging evidence."
"The victim forged evidence?" the judge questioned his eyes going wide. "He was the prosecutor behind a trial in this very courthouse just a few short weeks ago, and I was the one presiding over it... Who would have thought that he was capable of such a thing?"
"He was exposed for his crimes on the news not long ago," Prosecutor Lin went on. "The mysterious figure known as Oracle exposed the truth, using that trial from a few weeks ago that the defendant and victim were involved with as proof of his back alley dealings. The autopsy report was forged to make it seem as if the defendant was the culprit despite this not being the case. Oracle revealed this fact to everyone publicly a few days ago, and that was when everyone woke up to the truth of what he had been doing. You can imagine how this stirred up bad blood, especially given the fact that the defendant was the defense attorney on the trial that the victim was exposed over."
"You know, I have to wonder if she really does want to help us," I muttered under my breath to no one in particular. "Right now, it really sounds like she's trying to make it seem like Apollo was the one behind this murder."
"The evidence right now is critical in the way that it frames Apollo, as much as I hate to say it," Mr. Wright told me. "We're just going to have to take this case one step at a time to show that he wasn't the one responsible for Prosecutor Turner's death."
The judge nodded his understanding at Prosecutor Lin's words. "Thank you for your explanation of the case, prosecution. You may call your first witness at this time," he told her.
Prosecutor Lin smiled as she nodded as well. Despite the fact that she had just described so much about a murder, the air around her seemed to glow the same way that she did, and not for the first time, I was left to wonder just what was going on in the head of this contradictory woman. "The prosecution calls the detective in charge of the case to the witness stand," she announced without missing a beat.
From there, it didn't take long for Detective Skye to appear behind the witness stand, her hands grasping firmly at the strap of her bag. She wasn't making eye contact with anyone, and her expression was tight as could be. It didn't take a genius to be able to see that she was stressed out about something, and I could easily guess what the cause of the tension was. After all, this trial was already proving itself to be frustrating on all accounts, and it was only made worse by the fact that we were connected with the defendant personally. In other words, this was mess.
"Please state your name and occupation for the court, witness," Prosecutor Lin instructed with a small smile.
Detective Skye reached into her bag and pulled out a small container of the same Snackoos that she had been indulging in during the investigation the day before. It didn't take long for her to start eating them, her expression tense as could be. "Ema Skye, homicide detective and forensics investigator," she explained, shoving another Snackoo into her mouth as an attempt of pushing through her stress.
Prosecutor Lin didn't seem to mind in the slightest though, instead simply continuing to smile in the direction of Detective Skye. "Please share with the court the other reasons for which the defendant has been suspected of this crime," she instructed kindly.
"Alright," Detective Skye replied, her grip growing tighter on the bag of Snackoos in her grasp. I, meanwhile, swallowed back my nerves to concentrate on the situation at hand. I still had a bad feeling about all of this, but I was going to do what I could to push through all of this. I owed that much to Apollo and to myself.
~ Witness Testimony ~
~ Reasons for Suspicion ~
-"The defendant was found unconscious at the scene of the murder when the body was discovered."
-"A black jacket was nearby, something that seems to have been used to soak up the blood splatter at the time of the murder."
"-The defendant was covered in bruises when he was found too, lining up with the signs of a struggle at the scene of the crime."
-"There were no fingerprints found on the knife. In fact, the whole room was clear of prints aside from the victim's."
-"It seems as if the entire crime was on the clean side from start to finish. The defendant and victim fought before the victim died and the defendant passed out."
The end of her testimony left me frowning to myself. This was a pretty blatant retelling of the facts that we had heard the day before, but I still found myself wondering what it was that could be considered a crack in that story. If anything, there was one thing that I found odd, but it was hardly a contradiction when push came to shove.
"There certainly is quite a bit of evidence to make it seem as if the defendant was the one responsible for this crime," the judge declared, his eyes wide. "The fact that he was unconscious at the time of the body's discovery... It doesn't paint a nice picture for him."
"I'm inclined to agree, I must admit," Prosecutor Lin told him with a shake of her head. "It's not the best position for him to be in, and if anything, it only makes him seem seem more and more like the culprit."
"That's not a good thing to hear," Trucy hissed in my direction. "There has to be something that could be considered off, so we have to figure it out before our situation gets any worse!"
"Defense, begin your cross-examination at this time," the judge instructed, getting on with the trial just the way that I had been hoping that he would. I still didn't know how I was going to be handling the remainder of this case, but as I nodded in his direction, I knew that I would have to figure something out. This testimony was just the tip of the iceberg, and all that I could do from here was try to follow the peculiar lingering thread that was continuing to bother me even after our investigation.
~ Cross-Examination ~
~ Reasons for Suspicion ~
-"The defendant was found unconscious at the scene of the murder when the body was discovered."
-"A black jacket was nearby, something that seems to have been used to soak up the blood splatter at the time of the murder."
"-The defendant was covered in bruises when he was found too, lining up with the signs of a struggle at the scene of the crime."
-"There were no fingerprints found on the knife. In fact, the whole room was clear of prints aside from the victim's."
-"It seems as if the entire crime was on the clean side from start to finish. The defendant and victim fought before the victim died and the defendant passed out."
"Hold it!"
"So... Under this pretense of what happened at the time of the crime, it seems as if the defendant just fell unconscious randomly after the crime took place," I told Detective Skye. "That's hardly a logical assumption to make. You said that he was covered in bruises at the time of the body's discovery, right? That suggests a struggle between the two, and yet... I don't know. It all just feels odd to me that he would suddenly lose consciousness just after committing a murder."
"If you look at the report on his injuries as well, you'll be able to see that there were no signs of injury to Apollo's head," Mr. Wright interjected. "It doesn't seem as if there was anything to knock him unconscious that would have been out of the ordinary. Apollo doesn't have any medical issues that would have merited him falling unconscious randomly that way, and the medical report would have caught something as significant as a concussion."
"In other words, it wasn't his assault and fight against the victim that caused him to lose consciousness," I continued with a small nod. "The issue remains that he wouldn't have just randomly lost consciousness in the aftermath of committing the murder. It doesn't make sense no matter how you look at it. There must have been a reason for him to lose consciousness."
"Plus, his fingerprints weren't on the knife or anything else at the scene of the crime. I doubt that he would have been able to commit a murder where he struggled that much with the victim without leaving behind at least a few traces of his presence," Trucy pointed out. "He wasn't wearing gloves at the time of the crime either. They would have been discovered when the police arrived at the scene."
"Plus, if he had been wearing gloves when he was committing the crime, he wouldn't have been able to dispose of them before he lost consciousness, and that leads us back to the central issue of the matter," I finished for her. "There are too many holes in this theory from the lack of fingerprints to the fact that he randomly passed out right after the crime took place."
"Objection!"
"I believe that I may be able to offer an explanation as to the lack of fingerprints," Prosecutor Lin chimed in. "Do you remember the black jacket that was found at the scene of the crime? It was notably oversized, and if he wanted to, the defendant could have certainly used it to grip the knife without leaving behind any fingerprints."
"Objection!"
"The fabric of the jacket would have made it difficult for him to maintain purchase on the weapon's handle," I pointed out. "He would have lost his grip at some point during the struggle, and yet, that doesn't seem to have happened. That would be a clear contradiction of the facts."
"Do you have any explanations for this issue at this time, defense?" the judge questioned, turning his critical gaze in my direction.
I bit my tongue to resist the urge to say that I did have an idea. This seemed to point to the fact that there was someone else at the scene of the crime at the time of the murder, but I knew that wasn't going to fly quite so easily. How could it? After all, we had already heard that the murder was essentially a locked room case from Prosecutor Gavin. The door was forced shut when he and Simon first arrived on the scene, and they had to break into the room. There wasn't a way for anybody to have snuck in or out without being spotted, and everyone else at the scene of the crime had an alibi. We didn't have enough in terms of facts to say conclusively that Apollo and Prosecutor Turner weren't the only ones there at the time.
"Not yet," I admitted through gritted teeth, wishing that there was something in terms of evidence that would be able to push us in the right direction. As it stood though, there were too many holes in the facts, and it would undoubtedly be a while before we found what it was that we were searching for.
"I believe that we should hear another testimony from the witness for the time being," Prosecutor Lin announced. "There may be an explanation for the fact that the defendant seemingly dropped out and lost consciousness as soon as the crime took place, and I believe that our witness would be able to explain that much. What do you say to that, Detective Skye?"
The witness in question had been munching away at her Snackoos in the gap where she wasn't being addressed, seemingly not wanting to get involved with the argument that was taking place between myself and Prosecutor Lin. She swallowed down her current bite and nodded. "Alright... I can do that," she replied, but I could see the way that she was tense at the idea.
"Then go on and explain," the judge instructed with a sage nod. I didn't know where this was going, but I could already say that I didn't have a good feeling about it.
~ Witness Testimony ~
~ Losing Consciousness ~
-"It's fully possible that the defendant lost consciousness when the weight of what he had done caught up to him."
-"Shock can do quite a few things to the human body, especially when it comes to the death of another living thing."
-"He could have simply dropped out after he realized that he had killed the victim in cold blood."
-"That would allow him to lose consciousness without the prerequisite of a concussion."
"As soon as the murder was committed, the defendant lost consciousness. That seems to be the most likely outcome."
This was certainly something that I could work with. After all, the contradiction stuck out to me clear as day, and even as Prosecutor Lin cleared her throat, I found myself smirking. "As you can see, there is a perfectly logical explanation for all of this," Prosecutor Lin said casually. "This isn't as much of an issue as it has been made out to be previously."
"I would beg to differ," I told her with a shake of my head. "We would like to start the cross-examination at this time, if there are no objections."
"Go right ahead, defense," the judge instructed of me with a nod. I simply continued to smile. This was the chance that I had been waiting for, and I was going to take full advantage of it.
~ Cross-Examination ~
~ Losing Consciousness ~
-"It's fully possible that the defendant lost consciousness when the weight of what he had done caught up to him."
-"Shock can do quite a few things to the human body, especially when it comes to the death of another living thing."
-"He could have simply dropped out after he realized that he had killed the victim in cold blood."
-"That would allow him to lose consciousness without the prerequisite of a concussion."
"As soon as the murder was committed, the defendant lost consciousness. That seems to be the most likely outcome."
"Objection!"
"That is not possible, I'm afraid," I smirked with a shake of my head. "The defendant did not lose consciousness as soon as the crime took place. If it did, the culprit never could have ripped up the case file that could be found at the scene of the crime. Unless, of course, this happened in the midst of the victim's fight with the culprit, something that escalated to physical violence as the crime scene clearly shows. This conclusion makes no sense though, so that leaves us with a problem. How did the paper wind up ripped if the defendant supposedly lost consciousness right after the crime took place?"
The gallery began to chatter as Prosecutor Lin held up one hand to earn my attention. "The paper could have been ripped before the defendant lost consciousness. Perhaps there was a brief delay in his response."
I shook my head. "He wouldn't have been functional for a few minutes only to suddenly lose consciousness. After all, if he remained conscious for a few minutes, then he would have cleaned up an important piece of evidence from the scene of the crime: the writing in blood that spelled out his name next to the victim's body!" I exclaimed. "The defendant couldn't have lost consciousness right after the crime took place for the sake of the ripped paper. He also couldn't have been awake for a short time because of the writing in blood not being cleaned up. That sure is a conundrum, isn't it?"
The judge hit his gavel down as he glared to the gallery. "Order! How do you believe that this contradiction can be explained, defense?" he questioned of me, once again returning to the damning inquiry that I hadn't been able to answer before either.
I was only left to flounder for a few short moments though before Prosecutor Lin cleared her throat to take over the attention of the court. "I believe that this would be the perfect chance for us to move into a new subject," she announced. "We've heard quite a bit in terms of the basic facts of this case, and I think that it's time for us to elevate our way of thinking a bit. In other words... I would like to call one of the witnesses that discovered the body to the stand."
"I see... You may do so at this time. Detective Skye, you are dismissed," the judge said, shifting his gaze back to the witness stand. Detective Skye seemed to lose all of the tension in her body from pure relief, and she retreated from the stand a moment later, anxiety still knotted in her expression as she continued to chomp down on her Snackoos. I felt awful for her, and I made a mental note to try and catch up with her during the investigation if I could. I could tell that she was going to need the chance to talk with someone outside of the context of the courtroom as soon as possible.
Prosecutor Lin smiled as Detective Skye vanished from view. "With the basic details of the case having been laid out, the time has come for the court to hear the testimony of someone who was present when the body was found," she declared, placing one hand on the prosecutor's bench in a way that felt all too calm to be part of a murder trial. "This will be the first step to understanding the rest of the events as they took place at the time of the murder. With that said, the prosecution now calls its first witness to the stand!"
Trial time! Heck yeah!
I have to say that I'm already enjoying this second case a lot more than the first one. Granted, it was a pain in the ass to plan out this whole thing given the way that all of the pieces slot together in such a complicated way compared to the first case, but I think that it's all starting to pay off. Perhaps this case is better in my eyes because of the fact that we have a fun prosecutor to play with this time around.
Speaking of Sora, she's doing things! Sora is always a joy for me to write, and I love her laidback nature compared to other prosecutors. In a way, her being the antithesis to most other rivals in the mainline series is fun to work with because of the different ways that you can play with that. She's an interesting character for me, and she deserves all of the love in the world and more. Obviously, she's not the focus of this story, but I still think that she needs a bit of appreciation every now and again.
Next time, we'll be pushing on with this case to show what the first actual witness of this case has to say. Until then, I hope you enjoyed this chapter. Feedback is appreciated just like always. Have a nice day, everyone!
-Digital