5.1
"OBJECTION!"
"The defendant had no way of stabbing the victim with the knife!" Phoenix declared at the same time as he Awoke.
"And why's that, Mr. Wright?" the Judge questioned, flipping his gavel around in his hand. Phoenix quickly tried to rifle through his Loop Memories, when his eyes landed on the defendant's chair. Then he paled as he noticed what the defendant was.
"Because the defendant is a giant bee!" he yelled in horror. Indeed, a giant bee was buzzing above the chair. Upon realizing that it was, in fact, a bee, the entire courtroom screamed in terror. This upset the bee, and it began dive bombing every one it could. Phoenix and the Awake Miles and Maya immediately ran for it.
The Judge smacked his gavel down twice. "ThiscourtfindsthedefendantNotGuiltyAAAAAH!" he screamed, hightailing it out of there. The entire courthouse was evacuated, running away from the giant bee that just would not leave them alone.
5.2 (Crisis and myself)
"Was that... a soup can label you just flashed?"
"No, it's my attorney badge!"
"Really, because it looked a lot like a soup can label... Can you show it to me again?"
"Okay, there!" the item was shown for an instant before being stuffed back into the pocket it came from. "Happy now?"
"That looked more like your driver's license. An expired one at that."
"Oh, come on! Let me into the courtroom already!"
"Not until I can verify your attorney badge, which could be a while if you keep yanking it back like that."
Phoenix grinned as he noticed the commotion. Tipping the courthouse guards off to the fact that somebody was impersonating lawyers had worked wonders. And it helped that Tigre seemed to be slightly stupider this Loop than normal.
"Pardon me," he smoothly said, showing the guards his badge. Upon checking it, they nodded and let him into the courtroom. Phoenix whistled some random tune he had heard on the radio, walking straight past the gaping face of Furio Tigre.
5.3 (Thanatos's Scribe)
Miles Edgeworth glared at the Looper replacing Phoenix as his witness finished his testimony. He didn't have a problem with most Loopers. but this Looper was his equivalent of Billy in that not only did the Looper come up with some hare-brained explanations, but they actually let the defendant off!
"OBJECTION, yer honor!" the defending Looper exclaimed, causing both the Judge and Edgeworth to turn to him with intrigue and ire on their faces respectively.
"There's no way that my client could've killed that man, and I'm willing ta prove that!" the defending Looper declared, and the Judge contemplated this before nodding.
"Very well, Mr. Doe. You may begin your cross-examination," the Judge said. Miles gave the elderly man a quick, nearly unnoticeable glare for letting him speak, then turned back to the defending Looper, who had a vicious grin on his face.
"Prepare to be proven wrong, maggots!" Jane 'Soldier' Doe declared as he prepared his cross-examination.
5.4 (XeroM52)
Phoenix Awoke once again. He tried to stretch his muscles but found out that he didn't have a body at all.
'Huh? Where am I?' Phoenix thought to himself.
"Who's there?! Who is talking to me?" asked a very surprised young lady, who turned all around her to find out where the voice was coming from.
'Wait, what?' Now it was Phoenix's turn to be confused. 'What's going on?'
"Whoever you are, get out of my head now!" the young woman ordered in a frustrated tone.
'Wait! I mean no harm!' Phoenix pleaded. 'I just suddenly found myself inside of your head! I don't know what's going on!'
The girl looked hesitant but she couldn't detect any signs of deception in the voice inside her head. "Who are you?" she asked.
Phoenix remained silent for a moment. He was in quite a situation. He was inside the head of a young lady in a place that he didn't recognized. Should he tell her his real name and about the Loops? Or should he remain silent about his Looper status and get some info before he discussed anything?
'I…I don't exactly remember,' he expertly lied. He needed to play it safe for now. 'What about you? What is your name?' he asked.
"My name is Jean Grey."
Phoenix refrained from cursing out loud...thought...whatever. Now he knew where and who he was.
He was in the Marvel Universe and he was the Phoenix Force.
Fu…..n.
5.5 (Conceptualist)
Mentality, Phoenix sighed: dealing with the more inane loop variants was hard.
"Not Guilty!"
Especially when the variance was, well, it was flat out stupid.
"Guilty!"
This loop one of the better examples of how idiotic the loops could get.
"Not Guilty!"
Instead of the more normal practices of law he dealt with, there was this.
"Guilty!"
Two lawyers verbally ping-ponging back and forth about the accused being-
"Guilty!"
- or -
"Not Guilty!"
"Well, old chum, I have to say you've convinced me on this matter. I have no further objections to add to this trial."
"HA! I win again, Phoenix Bunny! My winning streak will continue forever more from this day forth, or my name isn't Miles Duckworth, Ace Prosecutor!"
The Judge's gavel struck wood, and the ensuing BANG brought the court to attention. "Then it is agreed! In the power invested in me as Judge of this court, I now pronounce the accused... NOT! GUILTY!"
'The sad part about this,' the aforementioned Phoenix Bunny thought, 'is that this is the fifth time in a row I won a case this way.'
5.6 (FTKnight)
August 3, 10:00 AM.
District Court
Courtroom No. 2
Phoenix gulped. He normally enjoyed starting his loop defending Larry. But now, he was not looking forward to this loop at all.
"All rise, the Honorable Judge Thor Odinson presiding," the Bailiff announced.
Phoenix desperately prayed in his head that Thor was Awake, otherwise he might be eating a bolt of lightning before the loop ended.
5.7 (Filraen)
If there's one thing Phoenix could do without, it was Dr. Grey's death and having to defend Maya again. Whenever Maya wasn't Awake (which was often, considering how the Loops worked) and he didn't Awaken early enough to prevent Mia's death, Morgan made it just plain difficult for Phoenix to prevent the murder and the accusation against Maya. Which made sense, Phoenix sadly realized, because Morgan wanted to take the Fey Clan Mastery for Pearls.
This would be the also the first case against Franziska all over again, though this time he was sure to bring some protection: a simple metallic fingerless gauntlet under the right forearm of his suit, which should be good enough to block that whip of hers. His left hand had to be free to point his finger at Ms. Miney this trial.
At the appointed time, the Judge's gavel signaled the beginning of the trial. "Court is now in session for the trial of Maya Fey."
"The prosecution is ready, Your Honor." As usual, Franziska had her eyes closed while her arm gripped her opposite arm.
"The defense is ready as well, Your-!"
"Phoenix Wright!" Franziska suddenly interrupted him and looked right into his eyes. "I have one thing to say to you before we start this trial: I don't know what happened or if you'd understand my words, but I'm afraid I have misplaced the fourth and final piece of evidence from the Gatewater Hotel case."
Phoenix blinked. A Gatewater Hotel case with Franziska? ...Wait! Could it be the pieces of evidence Detective Gumshoe took from the time Maya was kidnapped by Shelly de Killer? They only really needed the tape recording to convince de Killer to let Maya go unharmed, so Franziska kept the fourth piece of evidence with her almost every loop, as Edgeworth once confessed to him. But that wasn't going to happen until next year! Did that mean Franziska was looping too? Only one way to find out.
"Would that piece of evidence be a calling card which has been drawn on?" Phoenix said as he produced the card from a previous loop from his subspace pocket and showed it to the prosecution. "Something like this card right here?"
The prosecutor flinched as she saw the card Phoenix showed her, but quickly regained her composure with an air of anger and revenge. "You foolish fool!" Franziska said as she started lashing her whip. "How did you manage to foolishly get this card, when I was going to return it to you?"
The gauntlet worked somewhat fine. It managed to stop one or two lashes but Phoenix's instinct took over and he quickly hid under the defense bench.
"Come out and face me, Phoenix Wright!"
"Are you going to let me explain myself before bringing out the whip again?" Phoenix asked.
It was almost a minute until Franziska von Karma answered "Fine. Let's hear your answer."
With a bit of trepidation, Phoenix stood up and showed a second and a third identical copy of the card he had in his pocket. At Franziska's slightly surprised look, Phoenix explained. "For now, I'll just say all of these three cards are real, none of them are a forgery."
"How can this be?" Franziska asked, stunned.
"I'll tell you all the details later, Miss von Karma, when we aren't in the middle of an unrelated trial," Phoenix taunted. "After all, you've already realized the calendars aren't showing the date you think they should, am I right?"
Getting out of her stupor, Franziska von Karma smirked. "You'd better, Phoenix Wright! As for now, I've always wanted to battle you in court again. My mind is sharp and my whip is itching to be used."
Phoenix braced himself. Usually Franziska only wanted to trounce him to prove herself better than Edgeworth, now she just wants to "battle" him in court. Her being very whip-happy, in both halves of the word? He had to suppress a shudder.
5.8 (XeroM52)
Sometimes Phoenix felt like the multiverse had something against him. And if this Loop was any indication, it also liked to make fun of him.
"Don't worry Nick, I'll prove your innocence, dude!" was said by none other than his childhood friend and lawyer, Larry Butz.
'I hate this Loop already!'
In the end his only consolation was that he got to see what his life would've turned out to be if he had remained studying Art in college.
'Phoenix Wright: Professional Post-Modern Painter has a nice ring to it.'
That and he now had an excuse and free time to visit the Hazakura Temple at Eagle Mountain and meet a certain someone from his past again.
5.9 (OracleMask)
The downside of Awakening at random times in his baseline, Phoenix found, was that meant he sometimes Awoke too late to head off the worse cases he'd had to face in his baseline. Contending for the top spots on that list was Mia's murder and the Engarde case, but there was another certain person Phoenix tried to avoid seeing in court if he could help it: one Prosecutor Manfred von Karma.
But sadly, he'd Awoken this time just before entering court on the first day of Edgeworth's trial. Phoenix took a look at the Court Record and was glad to see his unawake self had gotten the right pieces of evidence ready. But it was still depressing to hear the unawake Edgeworth calling von Karma a 'god' of prosecuting.
"Not only will he do anything to get a guilty verdict," the man continued, "His fearsome skills usually end trials on the first day. They have never lasted for more than two."
Huh? That was new...and ominous...
"What do you mean, the trials never last more than two days?" Phoenix asked.
"It means what I said. On top of forty years of 'Guilty' verdicts," Edgeworth explained, "No defense has ever managed to keep the trial going more than two days. Manfred von Karma is a man to be feared."
Yeah, that explained everything...not. This sounded like one of those nasty variant loops. While they were being ushered into the courtroom, Phoenix wondered what sort of evil plots or plans were in store for him this time.
As it turned out, the answer was a lot more simple.
"Err...is the prosecution ready?" the Judge asked.
The small white figure perched on the prosecutor's desk abruptly pointed his matching white cane at the Judge. Well...the ruffles on the collar matched those of the regular von Karma, but otherwise there was no way you could mistake this guy for a fearsome prosecutor.
"FOOL!"
"Wh-What?!"
"My legend dates back to the Twelfth Century! That was a long time ago, you know. So naturally I have prepared well in advance for this trial. Do you understand?"
"O...of course!"
'...And yet, he's not the strangest person I've ever faced in this court,' Phoenix sighed.
"Now then, Ms. Hart -"
"OBJECTION!"
Phoenix nearly bit his tongue as 'Manfred von Karma' interrupted him before he could even ask his question. ...For the tenth time today.
"What? What now?!" Phoenix protested.
"You were about to ask how the prints of the defendant's right hand got onto a gun held by a left-handed individual, were you not?" von Karma said, sounding a bit smug.
"Wait, Mr. von Karma! Does that mean you know how it was done?!" the Judge exclaimed.
"It's quite basic actually, perhaps the simplest of tricks there is. True it may not seem so simple from an ordinary person's point of view, some people may even consider it a baffling, utterly perplexing problem. Things will often appear complicated on the outside while in truth they are simplicity itself. Of course how one sees these things depends on the person, many people find there is a fine line separating the complex to the very simple."
"I see, I see," said the Judge, nodding, "That does make sense."
Phoenix wasn't sure who was making less sense at the moment, the Judge or the 'von Karma' currently spinning around like a top.
Somehow, despite all the interference, Phoenix had dragged this trial kicking and screaming into the second day. Phoenix could see perfectly why this version of von Karma usually never had trials last this long.
'Even the best attorneys must have given up just so they could get away from this guy's craziness!'
And somehow he had to get them to the third day and prove this 'von Karma' guilty for DL-6...some loops, it didn't pay to be the multiverse's personal whipping boy.
...Actually, how would this version of Manfred von Karma have done it? Phoenix usually had to finger the bullet still buried in the man's shoulder to prove he murdered Gregory Edgeworth. But this guy...he was too short for that! This could be a big problem...
Still, once Yanni Yogi was on the stand, Phoenix began prodding at the man's 'forgotten' identity like normal -
"OBJECTION!"
"Wha- huh?! What now?!"
"Is there something you wish to prove, Mr. Wright?" von Karma chided him, "Then don't skip ahead! One must take time to think! Rushing forward without considering things beforehand is the height of foolishness. Ahh yes, that reminds of of another time when I had to consider things, that case was long ago but I remember it still. It was back when I still hung my hat on Bakers St. and called it home."
"...Isn't that Sherlock Holmes...?" Phoenix protested.
"And you wish to link these two cases now? And prove that this man before us is the culprit in both this and a certain other case?"
'von Karma' swung back and forth from making terrifying amounts of sense to making none at all so fast that Phoenix was afraid he was going to get whiplash. But he couldn't be confused for long, not when this guy was giving him such a perfect opening!
"Err, yes! Yes, that is exactly the defense's position!" Phoenix declared, pointing dramatically, "This witness is -"
"FOOL!"
There was a long, tense moment of silence. Which started dragging on when no one broke it.
"...Mr. von Karma?" the Judge hesitantly asked when von Karma made no move to speak or even lower his cane for two whole minutes.
"FOOL! A dramatic pause is required before an announcement of this importance is made!"
"R-Right! Forgive me!"
"The prosecution's position is this, Mr. Wright," von Karma continued, "That the catching and condemning of criminals is a task for the prosecution alone! Therefore I am glad to inform you that -"
The cane whipped around to point at Yanni Yogi.
"This man is the culprit! That's right! This man is the brother of the girl who went missing 10 years ago and the author of this terribly tragic tale of revenge and murder."
'What?'
Yanni Yogi abruptly dropped his brain-damaged old man routine to gasp in horror.
"Damn you, von Karma! How did you find me out?! My plans were perfect!"
'...What?!'
"My legend dates back to the Twelfth Century. This means that I knew in advance that the killer was you! Now, Judge, declare a verdict on this witness! Immediately!"
"Of course!"
The Judge immediately banged his gavel.
"In this case, the court finds the witness...GUILTY!"
'...WHAT.'
"And that is the tale of how my glorious record in court remained unbroken!"
"A fascinating tale indeed," Edgeworth replied in total seriousness.
"...Uh...weren't we all there? The case ended two hours ago." Phoenix asked.
Upon 'winning' the case, 'von Karma' had promptly invited everyone involved out to eat - and at a karaoke bar of all places. While the rest of the group got to chow down, Phoenix and Edgeworth were treated to a lengthy retelling of the events that had already happened.
"FOOL!"
The cane nearly poked Phoenix in the nose.
"Only an unawake fool such as you can fail to appreciate when those wiser than you share their history!"
As 'von Karma' promptly trotted off towards the karaoke machine, Phoenix's brain ground to a halt. Wait...'unawake'...did that mean this guy was...!?
"I'm looking for him, from United King, I'm going to Californiaaaaaaa~"
5.10 (Detective Ethan Redfield)
Another day, another loop for Ryu Sasakura, until a rarely seen looper entered his bar. Somehow the loopers always found their way to his bar. Miles Edgeworth, Ace Prosecutor of the Ace Attorney Universe, took a seat and looked to the man, "a glass of red wine, master."
Sasakura nodded, "Must have been a bad loop, since you first try my latest black tea recipe each time you visit."
After slowly pouring the bottle into a high glass, he corked the bottle and put it away. Edgeworth picked up the glass and took a sip, then gave a small grin, "On the contrary, it quite a productive loop. Have you ever heard of Harvey Dent?"
Sasakura blinked, "Mr. Wayne sometimes has a drink in his old friend's honor, since he has difficulty saving him from becoming Two Face."
"Even with Bruce's warning, I was unable to escape Mr. Dent's fate. However, I was able to heal my injuries almost immediately thanks to some application of medigel from the Mass Effect Universe. With Batman's assistance and Commissioner Gordon's experience, we were able to root out the evils plaguing Gotham and made it into a new Metropolis."
The bartender looked melancholy, "It must not have been a baseline then, since the very land Gotham was built on is rumored to be cursed by an evil warlock."
Edgeworth took another sip, "So I've been told. However, the three of us chalked it up as a victory since Batman was free to spend more time on the watchtower while Gordon and I kept the streets of Gotham clean. Gordon told me that thousands of lives had been saved thanks to my help."
He lifted his glass in toast, "To the stability and safety of those not looping, that we may find a way to safeguard the innocent and bring justice for the victims."
Sasakura nodded, "Here, here."
5.1 - Err...long story. Basically, Yggdrasil has a bee infestation. I can say that Sherlock Holmes doesn't see what the big deal is, though!
5.2 - wildrook: BURNED!
Drakohahn: What do you expect? He was trying to mess with a Phoenix.
5.3 - ...I've got nothing.
5.4 - In retrospect, I'm surprised this didn't happen sooner.
5.5 - "DUCK SEASON!" "RABBIT SEASON!"
5.6 - Or get tossed around by Category 5 Hurricanes. Whichever works.
5.7 - And our favorite whip-toting von Karma joins the Loops! Just guess where her first Fused Loop is.
5.8 - The irony is that Larry was a better lawyer than baseline Phoenix was at that point.
5.9 - Oh no, not him!
5.10 - I don't know about the cursed part being DC 'baseline', but good job you guys!