"Ooh, where is it-!?"

The young girl's voice was edging its way into desperation. Her tall top hat shook atop her head as she kept her last few minutes' routine of searching the room alive.

Maya wanted to help, but what could she do? Nick's daughter knew what she was looking for, but Maya wouldn't have the slightest clue what it looked like. Instead, she looked over at the other end of the room, where Nick was examining the cluttered floor space with equal intent.

She could barely believe that only a few months had gone by. The time since she once again left for Kurain had been filled with more major events than it had any right to. That awful case, which she'd heard all over the news, had been the start.

She remembered that morning, sitting beneath the small cavern waterfall behind Fey Manor. Pearl came racing in the moment she finished her session beneath the frigid torrent in desperate tears.

The reason for Pearl's frantic explanation was enough to put Maya into an equal panic, but her young cousin hadn't wanted to interrupt her training, and the minutes she spent waiting outside the cave had only further increased her panic.

Nick had been publicly disgraced, and the news was calling him a fraud. Maya's reaction was a storm of emotions, mostly of the sort that inspired her to physically attack those speaking against her best friend's character.

Arriving back in L.A. on the first train possible, only to find the office door locked and Nick refusing to answer it had done nothing to help. It hurt Maya deeply to imagine what her best friend was going through.

Nick had been thorough in locking himself away from the public eye, too, but not thorough enough for Maya. He'd removed the spare key from its place outside the building, but he couldn't touch Maya's own key.

"Nick…?"

Maya remembered the sound of the key in her hand hitting the floor as her shock caused her to drop it. Nick was there, huddled on the couch, looking worse than she'd ever seen him. It had only been three days since that trial; how had he fallen so far so fast?

A layering of stubble was covering his face and Maya doubted he'd showered that day. It was quite a change from just a few weeks later, when he'd become an adoptive father.

"Oh-!" Trucy exclaimed. Maya looked up. The cheery eight year-old was staring at something just over her shoulder. "Miss Maya, it's right there!" she said brightly, pointing a finger.

Maya turned. The office was a mess, in the middle of renovations. Trucy had insisted, and Nick was no better at denying his new daughter's requests than those of Maya or Pearl. Maya looked over the shelves behind the couch, still wondering what Trucy was looking for, exactly.

"Here," the girl said, walking past her. "Behind the stepladder."

Maya froze. Trucy ducked in close to the shelf and produced a shoulder bag shaped like a heart from the mess piled up there.

She was saying something, but Maya didn't hear it.

"Nick," she said, prompting Phoenix to look over at her.

"What's up?" he asked, approaching.

He yelped in surprise when Maya grabbed a hold of his grey hoodie to pull him down to her level.

"Nick," Maya repeated, her voice shaking, "Y'know, I thought…" She sighed. Phoenix just looked into her eyes with a questioning stare. "I thought we were making some real progress here, Nick."

"M-Maya, what-?"

"I can't believe you." Maya said, and by now her voice was getting melodramatic enough for Phoenix to realize she was messing with him. "After all I've done to help you, I find out that you're raising this poor little girl to be just as discriminatory as you are."

Phoenix straightened up, smiling when Maya released her hold on him. Maya clambered over the back of the couch toward Trucy. The girl looked on uncertainly.

"Don't worry, sweetheart," Maya said to her, "I won't let Nick just keep being that bad an influence on you. It's just a ladder."

Almost too late for today, but here we go.