Nick, Miles and Larry lay on the floor surrounded by loose sheets of paper. Today's homework was tough, even for Miles, which hardly ever happened to the nine-year-old boy. So, the three of them had decided to do it together that day. Nick had never really understood math though.

"Um, Miles?" Nick said. "You're supposed carry the 3, right?"

Miles looked over at his friend's paper. "Where did the 3 come from? 2 plus 9 equals 11, remember?"

"Oops," Nick said, erasing what he had written. "I hate math."

"It's not the most fun subject, I'll give you that," Larry said.

"My dad says math is important," Miles said. "You need it as an adult. If you don't know math, you can't get a job when you grow up."

"You sound like an adult right now," Phoenix said.

Miles gently shoved Nick, just to show that he wasn't amused.

"So what do you want to be when you grow up?" Nick said.

"Easy," Miles said, smiling. "A detective, just like my dad."

"I'm going to be a lawyer," Larry said. "Like a defense attorney. What about you, Nick?"

Nick stopped doodling on his math homework. "I don't know. An artist would be cool."

"I think the performing arts would suit you better," Miles said. "Like an opera singer."

"Why?" Nick said, not expecting that answer.

"You scream like a girl," Miles said, smirking.

"Grow up," Nick said, rapping his friend's shoulder.

"Pfft!" Larry's shoulders shook and he buried his face in the carpet.

"It's not that funny," Nick said.

Miles started chuckling.

"You scream a little higher pitched than usual and you never live it down," Nick grumbled. "It wasn't even my fault! You gave me a wedgie Larry!"

Miles and Larry laughed a little louder. Larry held up a fist, which Miles bumped with his own.

"So worth it," Larry said.

"Can we just finish this and be done?" Nick said.

"Alright," Larry said, looking at Miles. They burst out laughing at Nick's expense for a couple minutes. "Now we're done."

"Not what I meant," Nick said, getting annoyed.

Just then, Detective Gregory Edgeworth, Miles' father, walked into the room. "Leave the boy alone, Miles. After all, didn't you wear a Steel Samurai outfit to school once?"

"No," Miles said quickly.

"A good detective always has evidence, son," Gregory said, taking out his camera phone.

"Dad, we're doing homework," Miles said.

Nick and Larry stopped laughing when they ran out of breath. By then Gregory had already left.

"Interesting fashion statement," Nick teased.

"Girly," Miles said.

"Fanboy," Nick said.

"Hey, the Steel Samurai is cool, alright?" Miles said. "He brings justice, so there."

"Oh, be nice to her Miles," Larry said.

"Her?" Nick said. "I'm not the one who "accidentally" went into the girl's bathroom."

"Shut up," Larry said.

"Oh yeah, I remember that," Miles said. "Remind me how you got out of that alive?"

"Well, he was wearing a skirt," Nick said.

Miles snickered.

"It wasn't really a skirt!" Larry said. "It was just a towel."

"Same difference," Nick said. "Now who's the girl?"

"Pinch yourself and we'll find out," Larry said.

Eventually the "male bonding" subsided and the three boys finished their homework.

Miles left the room and came back with a plate of cookies, which he set on the floor around them. The boys were munching on a couple when Larry had an idea.

"You know what?" Larry said. "We should have a secret code! That way we can say stuff to each other without anyone knowing what we're talking about."

"What kind of code?" Miles said, intrigued by the idea.

"We got a bunch of paper lying around, let's brainstorm a bit," Nick said.

Excited by the prospect of a secret code, they immediately set to work. Nick suggested a picture based code, but then he saw Miles try to draw a flower and discarded the idea.

"Let's see here," Miles said, writing out the alphabet. "Maybe if we scramble the letters around? We could reverse the alphabet."

"So then "apple" would be…" Larry looked at Miles' page. "Zllpv."

"That's a little hard to understand," Phoenix said. "It should be something we could understand by reading or talking."

"Good point," Miles said and went back to the drawing board. "Hmm, 26 letters total… What could we do?"

"Let me see that for second," Larry said. He took Miles' alphabet page and started writing on it. He presented the end product to his friends. "A number for every letter."

"A equals 1, B equals 2, C equals 3," Miles read. "I get it. It might be kind of hard to remember though."

"If you find some milestones to help I think this could work," Nick said.

Larry beamed.

"I see," Miles said. "But what about when we're speaking in full sentences? How will we separate the words?"

Nick scratched his chin. "When we're talking, we can just say "space." Sound good?"

"Perfect!" Larry said.

"Hey Miles," Phoenix said, and held out a chocolate chip cookie. "25-15-21 space 23-1-14-20 space 1 space 3-15-15-11-9-5?"

As a matter of fact, Miles did want a cookie.

One day, Nick's mom took him to a fast food place for a quick lunch. As the term "fast food" suggested, they received their meals pretty quickly and were soon sitting down to eat. As they were eating, Nick's mom got a call on her cell phone.

"It's a business call," she said. "I'm going to step outside for a minute, okay dear?"

"Sure Mom, I'll be fine," Nick said.

Mrs. Wright went outside, making sure she could keep an eye on her son from where she was. Nick just ate some fries in peace. That is until a little girl wearing a strange purple dress-like thing came up to him, smiling wide.

"Hi there!" the little girl said.

"Hey," Nick said.

Another kid with short red hair, this one seemed to be his age, came up and took the little girl's hand. "Maya, we told you not to run off."

"Sorry," Maya said.

"It's fine dude," Nick said. "Are you her brother?"

"Brother?" the red-haired kid had really short hair and wore jeans and a tee-shirt. The kid smiled. "I'm her cousin. My name is… Dan. Dan Fey."

"Nice to meet you," Nick said. "I'm Phoenix."

"Hi F'Nick!" Maya said.

"Um, why don't you just call me Nick."

"Okay Nick!"

"Say, did you come here alone?" the red haired kid asked.

"No, I came with my mom. She's just outside," Nick said. "What about you?"

"We came with my aunt," Dan gestured over to a table where an older girl and a woman were sitting. "Maya loves burgers."

"They're the best!" Maya said.

Nick smirked. "Is that so?"

"My aunt takes us here a lot," Dan said. "Maya never stops asking, even though it takes two hours to get here by train."

"Why not go somewhere closer?" Nick said.

"We live in a pretty remote village. This is as close as it gets," Dan said.

"Really?" Nick said. "Wow."

The two kids were soon absorbed into a conversation about their lives, at some point the topic switched to school. It turned out that neither kid was very good at math. Maya just watched the two older kids talk, her eyes shining.

"What is it?" Nick said, once he noticed.

"Nothing," Maya said, grinning from ear to ear.

"What do you want Maya?" Dan asked.

"Well, um… Da? Is Nick your…" Maya giggled. "Special someone?"

Dan blushed hard. "Of course not."

"Special someone?" Nick said, looking at Dan. "Does she mean, like boyfriend and-"

"Forget about it," Dan said. "Her sister reads her too many fairy tales."

"How old is she anyway?" Nick said, shaking off his momentary confusion.

"Maya 3 Nick, Maya 3. Are you a bigger number than 3, Nick? I can go up to 7 Nick," Maya said.

"3, huh?" Nick said, smiling at the charming toddler. "I'm 10."

Maya's eyes widened. "That's big!"

"I guess it is compared to 3," Nick said.

Maya nodded her head. "You the same number as Da."

"Cool," Nick said.

Nick's mom rejoined her son at the table. "Oh, hello there."

"Hi!" Maya said.

Mrs. Wright smiled. "What's your name?"

"Maya!" the little girl said.

"I'm Dan," the red-haired kid said.

"Nice to meet you both," Mrs. Wright said, then turned to her son. "Phoenix, we have to go now. Did you finish eating?"

"Yeah Mom," Nick said, sliding off his chair. He grinned at the Fey cousins. "Nice you meeting you two."

"Yeah, nice meeting you too," Dan said. "Later."

"Good-bye!" Maya said.

The Wrights left the eatery, and Maya looked up at her cousin with shining eyes. She reached her arms up, and Dan bent down to lift her up. Before that happened, Maya grabbed her cousin's hat and ran over to her mother and sister. She jumped up and down relaying her interpretation of what had just happened.

"Dahlia's got a boyfriend! Dahlia's got a boyfriend!" Mia sang.

"Can we drop the subject now?" Dahlia said, rejoining her smiling aunt, her innocent, confused little cousin, and her older cousin who sang way too loudly.