Chapter Text
Fuyuhiko's lithe, freckled fingers worried at his tie. He couldn't seem to get the damn thing straight. His boyfriend had spent all morning helping him ensure his outfit was in shipshape, yet he just happened to look down, two seconds before entering the courtroom, and notice that actually, wait, was it kind of off-center? It looked a little off-center. And no matter what he did, it refused to center itself. This was bullshit.
He was considering shucking off the tie and burning it when he caught the telltale clack of finely-chiseled high heels. His back instinctively straightened to a terse point. He dropped his tie and glanced up in time to watch his defendant leer over him.
“Hiki! Oh, there you are!”
His client was a good head taller than him. Her long blonde hair was dolled up in an elaborate braid looking thing, her pale face dusted by the lightest sprinkle of freckles and blush. Her ash-gray suit was form-fitting and strict, at odds with her relaxed pose, not to mention the handcuffs linked delicately around her wrists. Fuyuhiko had no idea how the lady looked so fresh after having spent a rough night at the Detention Center, but he'd learned over the years to stop questioning the way his little sister operated.
A few police officers tailed her, watching the yakuza heiress carefully. As if sensing them, she wheeled around and blew a kiss at one of them before facing Fuyuhiko head-on.
He swallowed. “Hey, Nami.”
“Aren't you excited? Isn't this so exciting?” Natsumi went straight for the oaken doors, lightly pushing them open with a shackled hand. An officer staggered after her, hand on their holster.
Fuyuhiko blew out a sigh and tried to forget about his tie. He followed in his sister's steps, rushing down the following staircase to match her gait. “Exciting is sure a word for it.”
But he couldn't deny the developing fire deep in his gut, the warm prickle of sweat in his palms. He hoped to God his boyfriend's mentor wasn't here. He'd said he wasn't coming, so that should've meant he wasn't coming, but hell would that be awkward if he decided to surprise him with an entrance.
Thankfully, the beckoning podium at the left of the courtroom was devoid. Once they reached the bottom step, Fuyuhiko charged toward it—
When a cold hand at his shoulder lurched him to a halt. He paused. Nami was smiling one of her dead smiles, the type she usually reserved for hostages kept in the underbelly of their family's complex. Slowly her brow rose, and she asked, voice overblown with sugar, “You'll prove me not guilty, right, Hiki?”
Fuyuhiko snorted. “Yes, you bitch. Why the hell do you think I'm here?”
Her olive gaze shone, the same color as his. “To play a mean prank on me?”
“Yeah, let me just go through all this effort so that I can lock you behind bars.” He paused. Lowered his voice. “You really didn't kill this one?” They had a protocol for that kind of business, one that wasn't supposed to get them found out by a court of law.
Nami rolled her eyes. “Stop it, Hiki. That's mean.”
“What?”
“You think I'd be here if I'd killed—”
“Okay, geez!” Could she fucking say it any louder?
The officer gave his sister a look, and she retreated back to the defendant's bench, close enough to watch Fuyuhiko but far enough to keep her out of arm's reach. Probably for the best.
The defense's desk felt a lot quieter, colder, without his boyfriend beside him. Too spacious. Fuyuhiko had participated in a couple of his trials before—tagging along with him and his mentor—so he basically knew what he was doing. The framed license he'd hung up beside Hajime's said he knew what he was doing.
So he knew what he was doing. Essentially, he knew what he was doing. End of story.
Fuck.
Fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck.
The big judge hammer smacked against a hard surface, and Fuyuhiko's head jolted up. He dropped his manilla folder onto his desk and sort of fanned out his meager evidence to pretend it didn't feel so fucking little.
He met eyes with the prosecution across the way and blushed like an idiot. Swallowed. Cleared his throat. He had a very expressive magenta gaze.
“I believe,” began the Judge, an ornery old fart with a raspy tone, “that we have all finally gathered to begin the trial of Miss Natsumi Kuzuryu. Will the defense..?” He trailed, peered down at Fuyuhiko. “Ah. You aren't Mr. Hinata. Who are you?”
Shit. Fuyuhiko laid his sweaty hands on the desk's cool surface and commanded his brain to pull up the lines he and Hajime had rehearsed in front of the bathroom sink this morning, using their toothbrushes as microphones. “Kuzuryu. Fuyuhiko Kuzuryu.”
The Judge's brow furrowed, a gigantic impasse of wrinkles. “Are you related to the defendant?”
“Yes,” he exhaled, flushing, “but the thing is—You see—My boyfriend.” He coughed. “Mr. Hinata was supposed to defend her. But he woke up feeling really sick this morning! And it was like, super sudden. Like he was shitting and throwing up all over the place. It was awful.” The entire court audibly grimaced. “And it was such short notice? But I'm feeling fine, and I'm here, so we figured it'd be totally okay if I stepped in for him, just for today.”
The Judge observed him with his wizened old eyes, so gray and aged that they had since lost all color, for a long, chilling silence. Nobody spoke. Nobody moved. Not a single sound stirred for the duration of Fuyuhiko's judgment.
Then the Judge nodded slowly. “You promise not to ever defend Miss Kuzuryu again after today?”
Fuyuhiko nodded incessantly. “Course!”
“Then I suppose I'll let this conflict of interest slide, but just for poor Mr. Hinata's sake.” Humming thoughtfully, the Judge twirled his gavel in Fuyuhiko's direction. “Is the defense ready?”
“Yup.” He drummed his fingers on the podium, concentrating on his breathing. God, it was so quiet over here. No boyfriend to whisper to and get snapped at by his mentor for disrupting important legal business.
“Wonderful. And I must say, Mr. Kuzuryu, it's very sweet of you to fill in for Mr. Hinata like this. You know, my husband and I, we used to do all sorts of stepping in for one another in our youth. Ah, young love.” Sighing fondly, the Judge left that dropped bomb unexplained and turned to the prosecution. “And you, Mr. Souda? I take it this is your first independent case as well?”
Fuyuhiko's rival was a man in a smart electric green suit. The color should've been appalling, but it somehow worked perfectly for the guy. He had neat pink hair that had been braided back for the occasion, and a matching tie to boot. His magenta gaze glowed as it settled upon Fuyuhiko; when he opened his mouth, Fuyuhiko caught the glint of sharp teeth. “Yeah, but I'm ready. I plan to prove that lady fully and incont... uh... incontrovertibly guilty.”
The Judge blinked. “Thank you for the reassurance, Mr. Souda. Now let's see that backed up with evidence.” The prosecutor's face fell hard. “Now for your opening statement?”
Souda took in a slow breath, turning to his small pile of evidence. Then daintily he plucked a single photograph and held it up. “I don't think I'm gonna actually need a witness today? Because I think this piece of evidence pretty much sums up everything that happened.”
Really. Really?
“Hmm,” said the Judge. “I respect your gumption, Mr. Souda. Let's let Mr. Kuzuryu at least cross-examine this photograph before you close the case.”
“Oh—Of course!” He hurried over to the defense's side, smiling merrily the whole way. “Here ya go.”
Fuyuhiko took it, spread it out before him. The photo was blurry, way out of focus. It showed a dimly-lit alleyway, the one he recalled his sister detailing to him in her one free phone call from prison. A woman lay across the grimy earth, her long black hair haloed about her. She had been stabbed through the heart not once but multiple times. A crime of passion. Her clothes were torn around her chest, dyed by blood. Red splattered across her temple, too. It was a gristly sight.
Whistling, Fuyuhiko added the picture to his court record. “How does this prove Nami killed the victim?” he asked.
“Cuz.” Souda gestured over his picture. “She was there. And nobody else was there. So it had to be her.”
Uhhhhh huh.
This didn't even warrant an objection. Rolling his eyes, Fuyuhiko cleared his throat. “Hey, Judge? Can we have a witness?”
“Hey!” Souda squeaked, his voice cracking. “This is definitive proof!”
“Okay. And who killed the girl?”
“The defendant!”
“And where's the weapon?”
“I dunno, maybe she's hiding it in her pocket.”
Uhhhhhhhhhh huh.
“Hey Nami.” He leered over Souda's head to glance at his sister. “You got the murder weapon in your pocket?”
She dutifully inverted her pockets, sneering all the while at the prosecution. Empty, as they had been ever since she'd gotten taken in.
“Ah.” Souda bit his lip, took his evidence, and commenced a walk of shame back to his side of the courtroom.
While he did that, Fuyuhiko looked over the file he'd jotted down the night before. He didn't have much to go off of, but he figured he should jog his memory before the case started in earnest and he fucking forgot the name of the victim or something.
He skimmed over his written notes from Nami's phone call only to note that, oh, the victim didn't even have a name. Well that was just great. Who the fuck died exactly? Some girl with black hair. Alright. They were off to a fucking fantastic start. He must've been so tired last night that he hadn't even noticed.
Then again, back home, his parents hardly ever took names. So maybe it was just habit.
He shook his head. So Nami had been arrested for killing some girl in an alleyway, stabbed a bunch of times in the heart. Nami had been found near the alleyway, that was true, and it was like midnight when she got arrested and he got his rude awakening, and yeah, they didn't exactly have a long line of potential witnesses.
But they had Nami. Nami and whoever had examined that body.
Letting out a defeated sigh (so early in the trial?), Souda ran a hand through his hair, slightly dislodging his braid, and said, “Let's get this over with already. I call my first witness, the coroner who examined the victim.”
Great.
The Judge signaled, and in walked a nervous young lady in pink. She kept her head bowed the whole way up, her long, misshapen brown hair obscuring almost all of her expression, and her hands shook as she reached the witness podium. She linked them together and bowed even deeper before clearing her throat.
“What's your name again?” Souda asked.
“M-Mikan!” The girl flinched as if punched. “My name is Mikan Tsumiki. I-I did the autopsy report for the victim. S-Since we couldn't find any ID on the body, and w-we had quite little to go off of, I was asked to take very extra special care while examining it for clues.”
Souda stared at his own hands, pensive.
“Mr. Souda?” The Judge lightly tapped his gavel. “What should we question the witness about?”
“Oh! Right, right right right.” Souda kept blinking, his tanned skin partially drained of color. “Ms. Tsumiki, could you please tell us about what you noticed while examining the body?”
Though he had a kinda squeaky voice and some nervous eyes that didn't like to meet his, and he was clearly a total idiot, a strange fervor burned in Souda's gaze when he asked that question. Like a centering point, his posture shifted after the words left his mouth, squaring his shoulders and filling out his form. He licked his lips, and his cheeks burned with determination.
And Fuyuhiko sensed it, all the way from his side of the courtroom.
Mikan managed to raise her head enough to peer at the shoes of the attorneys. She smiled mildly, then bowed low enough to bonk her forehead against the podium. Recoiling, she flailed, regained her balance, then cried out softly.
Testify: “I Hope You Like My Autopsy! I Worked Really Hard on It!”
“The first thing I noticed about the victim is her death wound. It's very brutal!
“She was stabbed at least five times in the chest. From further examining, I could tell that the first stab was more than enough to kill her, so the last few were completely unnecessary.
“She did not feel pain from the other stabs, as far as I could tell, because I think she died instantly.
“What's even more interesting, however, are her hands! Because... they are totally covered in third degree burns!
“Not only that, but she has some very strange head damage.
“Whoever killed her must really, really, really hate her!”
With her testimony expunged, Mikan yelped and bowed her head, frantically running her fingers thought her hair.
The Judge tutted. “Thank you, Ms. Tsumiki. Are you ready for your cross-examination, Mr. Kuzuryu? You, uh, know what those are, yes? They're for a witness?”
Hell yes, he knew what a fucking cross-examination was. That was when Hajime locked eyes with the prosecutor and it felt weirdly homoerotic even though it wasn't supposed to be, and then he punched the desk and shouted OBJECTION! And it was very fucking attractive.
“I'm ready,” Fuyuhiko said, belatedly releasing his tie. He pored over Nami's written testimony one more time, but he was pretty sure what he wanted to talk about.
“OBJECTION!” Oooh, the adrenaline kicked straight through his veins when he punched his fist onto the wood. No wonder Hajime did it all the time. “I have a direct statement from the defendant herself, our only actual witness who saw the body, that says the only wounds the victim suffered were from the stabbing! The hands thing is bullshit.”
Mikan awkwardly stood there.
A frigid silence descended over the court.
The coroner blushed, cleared her throat again, and said, peering up through her messy hair at Fuyuhiko like a fucking witch, “I'm very sorry, Mr. Kuzuryu, but when I examined her body, I'm pretty sure there were severe burns on the cadaver's hands? I-I could check again if you'd like! I could go cut off her arm and bring it here for you to—”
“No, that's fine.” Fuck. He glared over at Nami, who granted him a single shrug. To his leer, she mouthed the word forgot. Oh, sure, fucking forgot a key piece of fucking evidence that fucking obvious, did she? He entertained the thought of strangling her for a second before returning to his job.
So. Shit. He had the photograph, and he had Nami's testimony—her fucking holey testimony, piece of shit sister—and yeah, that was about it. He peeked at the photograph, and, okay. The arms weren't really in the picture, but from where one of them had slumped over, it was clear that her fingerprints had practically been burnt off. There were tests that could take a sample of her DNA to try and figure out who the hell she was, but they'd take another day at least, and, well, the Japanifornian courts didn't stop for anything.
Transfixed, Fuyuhiko stared at the photo. It was so badly taken, the victim's body was vaguely blurry, as if her soul was struggling to escape from her skin before his very eyes. Must've been a shit photographer. Mikan herself? Her hands were still going, shaking hard enough to propel a generator.
Fuck. Now what?
He thought about stealing Souda's evidence, but with so many eyes on him, and the sweat trickling hot down his back, he was sure everybody would see him do it. He could try and stage a distraction, but now he was kind of panicking—heart jacknifing up his throat—and he wasn't exactly sure where to go from here. He only had one other piece of evidence, and now was definitely not the time to use it. He hadn't enough prepared for it yet.
Shit. His gaze was off-kilter. Shit. There was something he was supposed to do, something obvious. God was the courthouse quiet. It was the sort of silence you could bury yourself in, a casket, and never rise from again.
Souda caught his eye. He could smell it, whatever it was leaching off of Fuyuhiko's sweaty skin, and a biting smirk eased across his lip. He wore lip gloss—same green as his suit—and it was disturbing how nice it looked on him. He was about to speak up, green lips pursed, when—
“HOLD IT!”
The doors slammed inward, buffeting the walls, and behind them stood a goddamn vampire.
She had a parasol out. Wasn't that illegal or something?
The parasol shaded much of her face, but not enough to obscure the flash of blood-red lips and crimson eye-shadow. Freckles peeked in through her olive complexion, too dark for a typical vampire's and yet still unnervingly fitting. Her midnight hair had been styled in obnoxious ringlets that reached for the floor. Her dress was thickly-tiered, black on black on black with hints of mauve here and there, and the entire courtroom was befallen by a hush as her delicate heels tinked down the staircase.
Once she'd preened her way to the bottom of the stairs, she took the empty space beside Fuyuhiko and beamed down at him. “Hello,” she said. Her voice was smooth, polite, but he sensed a lurking beast beneath it.
“Hi?”
“I am here today,” she continued, “to defend Miss Natsumi Kuzuryu.”
The Judge coughed. “While it is an absolute delight to see you again, Miss Taeko, we actually have an attorney already.”
This Taeko lady twirled her parasol, unbothered. The sharp spokes on its corners swerved dangerously close to Fuyuhiko's face. “But you see, I am also defending her.”
Who the hell was she? And why was she here?
She met his eye. Procuring a doily from who the hell knew where, she gestured at him with a finger and whispered into his ear, covering their conversation with the doily. “My name is Taeko Ishimaru. Please—Taeko is just fine. Miss Taeko if you would be so inclined.”
He was not calling this freak Miss anything.
She went on, undeterred by the look on his face. “I am here to assist you. I may not be a lawyer, but I have partially absorbed the processes through my brother, a very skilled attorney, by the powers of osmosis. I assure you that I am on your side.”
Her burning red eyes brimmed with an energy, fierce and protective and heart-stoppingly loyal. He did not understand it, but he decided maybe he didn't have to, if she knew what the hell she was doing.
“Okay,” he finally said, turning to face the Judge. “Taeko here's my assistant for today.” She hid her smile with the doily, then pocketed it once it had passed. “Can we continue the cross-examination?”
“Of course,” said the Judge. “You and Taeko confer. Perhaps new evidence will come to light.”
Taeko nodded, eyes crinkled at the edges. Then she pointed her parasol toward the witness stand. “Madam Coroner, my dear, would you please remind me of what we are speaking of at this time?”
Mikan recoiled, then linked her hands together fiercely. “The, um, the victim is yet unnamed, but she was stabbed multiple times in the heart, suffered brain damage, and had her hands burned severely. W-We couldn't find any identifying features on her, and, well, the fingerprints are gone, so...”
“Oh wow,” Taeko said, “how exciting.” Yeah, she seemed the type to be into that. She clapped together her gloved hands. “May I ask, Madam Coroner, who found and reported the body?”
“Nobody,” Mikan said. She played with a long strand of her hair. “The, um, the police on duty just stumbled across it. It looked pretty fresh, so they scouted the premises and found the nearest person to the crime. It seemed obvious she'd committed it..?”
Taeko pursed her lips. “I see.” The way she said it cast doubt on every single fucking person in the room. It was chilling. It was sensational. “Is our detective available for questioning?”
Mikan shook her head, hair standing on end. “O-Only a couple officers came to investigate. It seemed like a closed case, so they have nothing to, uh, add.”
What the fuck?
“Then,” Taeko continued, “it is readily appearing that we are missing important matters of this case.” She shot a dangerous glance at the prosecution, and Souda shivered all over. “Madam Coroner, I am deeply curious about these wounds suffered by our lost maiden. Could you please describe them each in detail?”
“Sure..?” Mikan spared a glance at Souda, but he just kind of shrugged. Taeko's unrelenting stare cracked her. She whimpered a breath. “They, um, they looked really harsh and serrated, like they were used by a pretty nasty weapon.” As she spoke, Fuyuhiko's gaze tilted. He watched his sister and her impassive complexion. “The wounds looked different than ones meant for cold, calculated murder. Angrier! The hands, too. They must have been burned by a small flame with great, great care.”
“And you keep mentioning brain damage,” Taeko continued. “Could you express that in detail?”
“Yes! I actually—um—I took a lot of anatomy classes in college, so I can get pretty detailed! Brains are super interesting to me. I know a lot about them!”
Taeko nodded, eyes widened. “Please go ahead, then.”
Ah, that's what Fuyuhiko was missing. He kept carefully watching his sister for a reaction.
“Well, on first glance, it looks like some sort of severe head wound. Like it just got bonked really hard against something. But the thing is, when I really started examining the head, I noticed, oh! That is an abnormal head wound! Because, because.” Mikan's hands were flailing all over the place as she tried to explain. “There were incisions in the brain! Deliberate ones, made by a weapon! Made by a fierce, serrated weapon. And it was too damaged to tell for sure, but it looked like sections of the brain had gone missing? That or they were destroyed beyond recognition.”
Huh. Fuck.
He swore he could see something swimming beneath the surface.
“O-Okay!” He jumped in place. He had his momentum back. “So do we know what these blades are? Any evidence? Any, uh, pictures?”
“No,” Souda said, chewing his lip. “We only have the one Ms. Tsumiki took of the crime scene before they carted off the body to examine it in further detail.”
“It was around midnight when I did that,” Mikan said, her smile drooping off her face. “I haven't slept since then.”
Sometimes Fuyuhiko really wondered whether the yakuza were the true villains of their society, or if the law just fucking painted it that way to let shit like this slide.
“So we don't know,” Fuyuhiko continued, “what the murder weapon is.”
Silence.
“Well,” Souda said. “Not the weapon, but I have something.” Oh great. He picked up a small lighter at his side, small but ornate and—shit. Fuyuhiko recognized its insignia immediately. A smug look passed Souda's face when he said, “This was found in the defendant's hand.”
Great. Whatever.
“It's not proof of anything,” he snapped. It provided a possibility, but that was nothing. Not even a murder weapon. God, of course she had her lighter on her at the time.
Okay. Okay. He could work with that. Taeko granted him an odd look, but she didn't add a word.
“I don't have...” He licked his lips. “Any, uh, other questions about this testimony.”
“However,” Taeko broke in, “we are still not finished with this witness.” Souda's head lowered. “Sir Prosecutor, might we ask further about this alleyway crime scene? I believe we still understand quite little of the circumstances.”
With Taeko's eyes on him, Souda could do little but swallow sharply and relent. “Uh, yeah, good question. Ms. Tsumiki, what was the state of the crime scene?”
“Grimy!” she said.
“Yeah, but can you testify about the situation surrounding it?”
“Oh. Uh. Yes?”
Testify: “It Was Very Gross!”
“We found the victim in a pool of her own blood. Poor thing!
“I really wonder what she was doing out so late at night, and by herself to boot.
“The alleyway we found her in was situated between a couple of shops on the lower-end of town.
“On the right side was a butcher's shop, and on the left, a shoe store.
“But I don't think they were correlated?”
She bowed her head, and the Judge signaled for the cross-examination. Souda was staring at the coroner, his expression almost unreadable but for the fierce scrutiny in his gaze and the sharp divot in his brow.
Taeko nudged him. He peered at her through the corner of his eye. “What?”
“These instances,” Taeko said, “are sounding correlated to me.”
“They are? But she just said—”
“I think she is unsure about what she saw. It was late and she is very tired. I think she just wants to go home.” Taeko smiled wanly. “Poor dear.”
Clearing her throat, she raised her voice and said, “HOLD IT!” Mikan fell against the podium and half-hid behind it. “Oh, my. Please come back out. I only had a couple of questions to ask you, my lady.”
Inexplicably blushing all the way up to her roots, Mikan managed to straighten enough to face her.
“This is called Pressing,” Taeko said to him. Somehow he'd never figured that one out. Maybe he should've paid more attention to the things in between Hajime's objections. Wasn't as hot though, and a lot more boring. “May I ask about the victim's state of appearance? You mention that you wonder what she was doing out so late on her own. Was she holding or carrying any items that may solve this question?”
“Oh! Oh!” Mikan leaped up and pulled out an entire bag from one of her apron's voluminous pockets. “I know this one!” Thank god. “She had this grocery bag on her, which held some half-used boxes of cookies. I unfortunately did not bring the cookies. I'm really sorry.”
Taeko's smile softened. “How about her wallet?”
“Oh.” Mikan's shoulders fell. “We couldn't find that.”
Damn, whoever killed this chick really wanted her not to be identified. Then again, maybe they just wanted her money. Apparently not the cookies.
Her brain. They'd gouged her fucking brain. Of all things.
“A phone?” Taeko continued.
Mikan whimpered. “I'm sorry...”
Taeko tutted. Fuyuhiko looked down and saw her pulling out an entire bottle of blood-red nail polish. She was painting her nails, or—wait. She wasn't. She was painting the photograph.
“Taeko?” he squeaked. “You're ruining evidence.”
“Oh?” She cleared her throat and resumed. But her eyes were on him, needle-sharp.
Wait.
She was trying to tell him something.
Her glossy nail polish covered the area surrounding the victim's body, picking out small odd shapes in the alleyway. He peered at them. They were sharp, jagged, misshapen. And the window above them was oddly dark, not as shiny as the one beside—
“OBJECTION!” he hollered. Mikan squeaked and hid her head in her hands. “They fucking wanted something with the butchery! It was to the right of the body, yeah? Well, the window's totally been blown open! And it looks like the glass was totally speckled with blood—so it must be related somehow!”
Oh. Shit. So they could've broken in and used whatever the hell they found in there to let loose onto that poor girl.
But did that mean—Could that mean the stab wounds over the chest were obscuring something, too? Cuz those could've easily come from a second implement in this butcher's store. What a weird fucking place to get killed next to. (Unless it was intentional. Unless it was intentional and there were great, shadowy works at play, obscuring the original crime's intents.)
The gallery was just eating all this up behind them.
He heard his sister's chair squeak. She hadn't gotten up, but she sat in place, rigid. She was staring at Taeko, staring almost through her.
Fuyuhiko's attention was redirected by the coroner's wail. “I'm sorry! I'm sorry! I did such a bad job! I'm sorry, everyone!”
Taeko strode past him to take one of Mikan's shivering hands and hold it close to her heart. “Oh my,” she murmured. “It is alright, Madam Coroner. Do not fret. You had such a long night. It is only understandable that you missed some important details. You must be so very tired. Fear not; you still granted us cause to approach the truth.”
Was she a lesbian? She had to be a lesbian.
Souda, the idiot who'd brought them the photograph in the first place, clammed up entirely. God, what kind of prosecutor was he? Fucking idiot. Fuyuhiko had just started out too, and yeah, he had this vampire psychopath helping him out a little, (and yeah, he hadn't noticed the glass either until she'd pointed it out), but still.
“Order! Order in the court!” The Judge's gavel rang down upon them. “Come on, everyone. Let's keep things civil. Taeko, please return to your side.” Taeko muttered something about gullible judges and did so. “Well! I certainly did not expect this. Mr. Souda, have you any explanation for the broken window?”
Souda flushed. “I—Uh—Yeah!” But as the silence distended around him, and he fidgeted with his bronze rings and the piercings up one ear, it became evident that, no. Man. Why was he here? Fuyuhiko was about to speak over him when he caught his eye and flinched. “The defendant! She must've done that, too!”
Bored, Natsumi stared at her hands. Her handcuffs had been removed once she'd sat down, but she was flanked by nervous officers.
The idea sparked in Fuyuhiko, sudden and overpowering. “Hey. Can, uh, can Nami testify about what she saw last night? That might help us piece together the murderer.”
Hmm. Nami didn't like that. Her brow furrowed, and her lips scrunched into a nasty pout. “Hiki,” she said, “I don't think I have anything important to add to the crime scene.”
“Do you?” Taeko asked lightly. Her head cocked, parasol twirling. “Do you really? Natsumi, are you daft, or do you just really not feel like standing up?”
Nami's mouth fell open. “Do you just hate me now, Celestia?”
Taeko giggled. “Perhaps!”
“You bitch.”
“Oh, no, I believe you are mistaken, for the bitch is you.”
Everyone just sort of watched this procession go on, mouths open.
To Natsumi's cold silence, Taeko flashed a smile at her brother. “We dated a couple years ago. Has she truly shared nothing about me with you?”
Uhhh. Maybe? Fuyuhiko was kinda busy with his law degree and all that, so it could've just slipped through the cracks.
Wait, did that mean she was gonna prove Nami guilty, or..? Wait, why was Taeko here? He still had no idea.
“I loved you,” Natsumi muttered.
Taeko smirked. “That's nice. Sir Judge, might it be possible to cross-examine her?”
Souda leaped to their defense. “Yeah. I wanna hear the lying words from her mouth.” There it came again, the fierce jawline, the fire in his complexion.
“Well,” the Judge said. “If you insist, Mr. Souda, then we very well should have her testify for us. Thank you, Ms. Tsumiki, for your time. You are free to go.”
Mikan yipped and turned tail.
With the space cleared, Nami sighed and stood, stretching. Then she meandered over, taking her time. “Alright. So I'm here now.”
“And you promise,” Souda hissed, eyes narrowed, “to share the truth and nothing but the truth?”
“I guess.”
“Do you swear?”
Nami rolled her eyes and pinned her hand to her breast. “I do solemnly swear.”
Fuyuhiko recognized that smirk. He'd made one of a similar caliber while Hajime was helping him forge his law degree.
“Then I ask you,” Souda continued, “to tell us what you were doing out so late on the night of the crime.”
Nami sneered.
Testify: “None of Your Business”
“I was out late. I like late walks.
“Is that so bad? The victim clearly enjoyed her late walks.
“Her cookies, too. I didn't know anyone else liked the Bad Bunny brand.”
Smiling lazily, she shut her mouth.
Man, she'd just come up here for the first time, but the moment she'd started fucking talking, he'd known. God. The sweat poured down his back in a stream.
Taeko peered at him in the corner of her eye. When their gazes met, she sighed almost imperceptibly. So she'd seen it too.
Fuyuhiko groaned into his hands. “Objection, you piece of shit.”
His sister recoiled. “What? The hell'd I say?”
“How did you know the victim liked that brand of cookies?”
Nami's head cocked. “Cuz I saw them?”
“Yeah, and where the fuck did you see them?”
“Uh.”
Yeah. Bingo, bitch.
“Someone else brought it up,” she tried.
Souda jumped in on her. “Who? Ms. Tsumiki just mentioned that there were cookies, and as you recall, we have no other witnesses!”
“Shit,” Nami muttered.
Well, great.
“You saw her body,” Fuyuhiko said.
“I did not see her body,” Nami snapped. “I was picked wrongfully to be the defendant for a murder I knew nothing about.”
“You walked past her body,” Fuyuhiko continued, undeterred, “on your evening walk. And you saw the cookies.” And knowing her, she stole at least one, murder victim or no. She loved those cookies. They were dark chocolate and full of marshmallow and if he wasn't lactose intolerant he'd probably love them too.
Nami worried with her suit jacket, glowering at her feet. “I saw,” she finally said, “the body on my evening walk. And that's how I knew about her cookies.”
“Oh!” Souda's chest puffed out. He looked like an insane peacock. “Please relay to us what you saw on your evening walk past the murder victim, Ms. Kuzuryu!”
She smiled with her mouth open, like she was considering biting the prosecutor's head off.
Testify: “I Saw the Body. It Was Already Dead, By the Way”
“Okay, so the body was extremely dead when I came across it.
“What really caught my eye was, obviously, the cookies. Because those cookies are so fucking good!
“So I barely noticed the body at all. That's why I forgot.”
And she shut her stupid mouth. Fuyuhiko blew out a long sigh. Nothing deeply incriminating, not that he could immediately point out, but now his hands were quivering a little and for the love of God would they stop? Nope.
Taeko nudged him. “I would like to question her,” she said.
“By all means,” Fuyuhiko said. He probably shouldn't give her so much power when for all he knew, she intended to get his sister proven guilty because of one bad breakup, but he was jittery and she'd proven herself to be pretty smart, and what the hell. How much havoc could she wreak?
“HOLD IT!” A giddy smile launched across Taeko's face as she pointed her finger at the defendant. “How could your memories be so focused on the cookies, and not the dead body?”
Nami shrugged. “Dead bodies aren't as interesting as free cookies.”
“While I contend to that,” Taeko said, “I must know. What do you recall concerning the dead body? Are there any clues we may yet excavate from your testimony, as the singular witness of this crime?”
Nami's face had softened slightly as Taeko spoke to her. It was kind of disturbing. “Why did you stop going by Celestia?” she asked.
Taeko blinked. “Long story. If you really want to know, you should read KIYOTAKA ISHIMARU: ACE ATTORNEY.”
Nami huffed. “You care about me so little that you won't just tell me yourself?”
“We are in the middle of a murder trial, may I remind you.”
“Taeko has a point,” Fuyuhiko broke in. “Can you just explain the fucking corpse, Nami?”
“Fine,” Nami said. “It wasn't very interesting, that's all! It wasn't mutilated in the slightest.” It—What. “Maybe if there was some blood, I'd be invested, but bludgeonings aren't that interesting if they don't really disfigure the body at all!”
Oh, shit.
Souda gasped quietly. “Th-The bludgeonings..?” His face paled considerably.
“Yeah, it just wasn't that interesting. You couldn't see the bruises under her shirt or anything.”
Taeko politely coughed into her handkerchief. “How did you know about these bruises, Natsumi?”
Nami snorted. “Cuz that's how she died?”
“And yet,” Taeko breathed, “these rather interesting bruises were seemingly covered by all of the stabbing in her chest. That is where they were, yes? Underneath the victim's gore?”
“Yeah,” Nami said. Then she crashed to a halt. It was in her eyes, totally fractured. Her lips hung ajar. “Fuck.”
“Nami,” Fuyuhiko said.
“Hiki.”
He wanted so badly to kill her. “Nami, did you witness the murder? As well? Did you watch the murderer kill the victim?”
A saccharine smile lurched across Nami's face. It looked so out of place it was sickening. “Of course not! Don't be silly. Why, didn't you know, when I stumbled across the body on my evening walk, she had already been quite very dead! In fact, for some horrible, disturbing reason, the murderer had half-unbuttoned her shirt, or perhaps she just liked wearing her shirts half-unbuttoned, for it was through this half-unbuttoned shirt that I saw the terrible bruising on her chest! I wanted to be a decent person, so I buttoned her shirt back up after borrowing a few of her cookies. You see? A logical reason.”
His sister was about the most divorced someone could get from logic.
He should've known this would be a constant, unending train wreck of a case. He should've fucking known. He'd grown up with this idiot, had had her in his life since he was like two years old. He'd heard her stories about sneaking into the dungeons, sometimes without their parents' permission, and seeing what she could accomplish on their own. He'd watched her dead stare develop through the years, forged through the fires of blood.
She knew better! Why kill someone in the middle of a street? In public? Where the police couldn't just pretend it hadn't happened and turn a blind eye?
What the hell was she thinking?
Frustrated, Fuyuhiko took a few furious notes of her blasphemy.
“You liar!” Souda spat. “You killed her, didn't you?”
Nami scowled. “Really? That's kind of rude on your part, assuming I did it.”
“Who else could've done it?” Fuyuhiko shouted. “Nami, did you witness the murder? Did you see them kill this girl?”
Nami rolled her eyes. “Shut up, Hiki. You're not helping.”
“You are lying in a court of law!”
“I TOLD YOU!”
Her cheeks blurted pink. Gasping, she fanned herself. Shook her head. Straightened. “Hiki, I told you I didn't kill her! And you.” She leered at the prosecution. “You think just cuz you picked up the first guy on the block that they just had to've done it. Well, sorry to disappoint, but I didn't!” She pushed back her hair and stared dead straight, as if through the courthouse entirely. “I told you everything I know. I saw her on my evening walk. She was already dead.”
Souda was taking in hard, heavy inhales. Fuyuhiko had to beat him to the punch:
“Nami, listen. Maybe that's the truth. I clearly wouldn't know cuz I wasn't there. But to us, all we're hearing is that you are the only person who saw this girl. For all intents and purposes, it currently sounds like you did it. So we need to prove that you didn't. Cuz you didn't.
“Now I am asking again. Nami, did you see someone kill this girl? Or if not kill, then did you at least hear the glass shatter on the butcher's window? How about witness the moment the poor thing's hands got burned? Do you have even the tiniest clue for us to follow?”
“Make it testimony,” Souda snapped.
Nami didn't face either of them. She just stood there, impenetrable, shadowed in grays. Statuesque.
Testify: “Murderer”
“Sure. I saw the murderer. I watched that girl die, in fact.
“But she was dead when I walked by her, so I'm not technically lying.”
And she was done. And she was done? Really? That was it? God.
“Who murdered her?” Souda screamed. “You can't just end it like that!”
The Judge tutted. “Mr. Souda, it's Mr. Kuzuryu's turn to—”
“Fucking answer the question, Nami,” Fuyuhiko said.
Taeko, at his side, was squinting at her. She turned away and began poking through Fuyuhiko's evidence. He didn't stop her.
Natsumi's cheeks colored slightly. She swallowed. She spoke. “I don't know who murdered her. It was all so sudden. I didn't get a good look.”
“Evidence!” Fuyuhiko shouted. He punched his desk. “Give us evidence, Nami! An article of clothing! A hair color! Something!”
She shrugged. “It wasn't me, so...”
“Nami!”
He hated her so much in that moment, with the fire to power a dormant volcano. Like a well, it festered, and not even he knew for how long it had slumbered within him.
He caught it, then. She blinked sharply, struggling to dispel the panic in her gaze. Her voice wavered, but she held it to a mostly level low. “Ugly? The murderer was like, super ugly.”
“What does that even mean?” Souda asked. Fuyuhiko had to admit that he agreed with him. “Why can't you give us a single trait?” His gaze glittered. “Is—Is it because you did kill her?”
“N-No.” Nami bit her lip. Took in a deep breath. Let it all out.
Then she looked directly at Fuyuhiko and smiled. She swallowed, and all the tension evaporated from her face. Freeing.
She had come to a decision.
“You should ask the other witness.”
No.
“The what?” Souda gasped.
“The other witness. You heard me.” The smile hitched up Nami's face. “She probably got a better look at the murderer. Because, you see, I just remembered that I was not on my walk alone.”
No no no no no no no.
“Her name's Peko-Peko. Oh, my bad.” She giggled into a hand. “Peko Pekoyama.”
Taeko looked up.
“You should call her. I'm so sorry I forgot she was with me.”
He was going to strangle his sister with his bare hands.
“There's another witness,” Souda whispered. “We need—Oh, dude—We have to find her!”
The Judge sat up. The moment he plucked his gavel, the gallery's outcry roared against him in a deluge. He gritted his teeth, pounded his gavel one, two, three times, and called, “Order!” Slowly the tumult receded enough for his voice to come out clearly. “With this pertinent information coming to light, we will now take a thirty minute recess to locate and prepare Miss Peko Pekoyama for a witness testimony.”
Fuyuhiko's forehead hit the desk. He breathed in one long, long breath and told himself not to do anything stupid. If he reacted, if he reacted too strongly—If a word escaped that compromised her—
Breathe. Breathe. He swallowed down his anger like a smoldering comet, let it fizzle out in his stomach.
Taeko tapped his shoulder. He straightened enough to face her, his cheek still half against the cool wood. She was holding his ultimatum.
Shit.
He hadn't even thought of that. It was a simple document, not even filled out all that much yet, but she had underlined a section of it in red nail polish.
“I agree,” she merely said. “I hope this will help us protect her.”
God. God.
He did too.
To Be Continued...