December 25, 2:05 pm
Athena lingered in the hallway outside of Simon’s room for a moment longer than was strictly necessary. It wasn’t quite nerves…the feeling was too subtle and quiet for that…but it wasn’t anything all that pleasant either.
She”d gotten the word that Agent Ash was ready to receive them for the interrogation of Number 24…which meant Athena had to prepare herself. She raised her fist, and knocked on the door.
“Come in,” Simon responded.
When she opened the door, she found them sitting next to one another on the bed. Halblicht had his jacket off, but otherwise they were fully dressed. It looked like they’d probably been chatting.
Robert raised his hand in a polite greeting when she entered. “Ms. Athena.”
“Robert!” Athena smiled. “Simon! Ah…hope you guys have a moment. I got word from Interpol…they want us down there for an interview with …you know.”
“We’re not busy, Athena,” Simon said, “Just…. catching up. If there’s business to attend to, then that’s what comes first. At least today.”
Robert huffed a noise that was almost a laugh, and shook his head. “Yes. I’m certainly not going to miss my opportunity to talk with her.”
“I didn’t think you would!” Athena pumped her fist. “Come on, they’ve got a car for us lined up.”
“Not being held at the hotel then. Good,” Robert nodded and stood. She watched him smoothly grab Simon’s wrist and help the prosecutor to his feet. Simon looked flustered, and adjusted his jinbaori, but he didn’t protest.
“Interpol’s not quite that stupid,” he drawled.
“Y-yeah uh, I can’t imagine where they’d be keeping her in this place.” Athena laughed. “they took her to one of the stations nearby and basically took over security there.”
“Wonderful. Lead the way then, Cykes-dono.” Simon smiled and held out his arm for Taka, who flapped his way to his favorite perch.
Simon’s emotions– for the first time in days– seemed remarkably calm and even.
Athena smiled widely, and took a deep, deep breath “I see you guys talked it out..good” She put her hand on the doorframe as she turned and headed out. “you seem happier.”
Simon flushed and touched his chin reflectively, glancing away. “Yes we– resolved the matter civilly, to a degree.”
Behind his back, Bobby showed through on Halblicht’s face, grinning and giving Athena a big thumb’s up.
Athena flashed a broad smile and a thumbs up right back. “Good! I knew it’d work out…just don’t make me feel like a third wheel on the ride over, alright guys?”
Simon started to cough so hard he nearly doubled over. “Athena!”
Bobby meanwhile, laughed, and snapped a salute to her. “We would never, Ms. Athena! It would simply be unjust!”
Athena saluted him back with a wink “Sorry Simon, I’m just calling it like I see it.” If nothing else…she could make sure they had an entertaining ride, at least for her.
December 25, 2:55 pm
Interpol was using the detention center downtown to hold Robert’s fellow asset. It had a low, foreboding feeling, and it was strange to be ushered around such a foreign precinct. But he was nothing if not adaptable, and he and Bobby led Simon and Athena confidently along after their interpol guide into the belly of the labyrinthine building.
At least until they parted ways. Simon and Athena were ushered into a viewing room– and Halblicht was frisked thoroughly by the interpol agent before he was allowed near the holding cell.
The door was solid iron, offering only a single viewing window through a barred slot in the center of its face. The interpol agent fished out a key to let him inside.
“Remember the rules you were given when you were frisked, Detective.”
“Understood, agent.” He nodded seriously and snapped the man a salute, before sliding into the cell.
The door shut with a heavy thud behind him, and the sliding of a lock back into place. The interrogation room before him was small, unadorned save for the chair and table set between him and the girl staring him down with cool grey eyes.
The mask was gone, torn away and locked up in evidence with the rest of her gadgets and effects, leaving the true face of ‘Number 24’ staring him down.
She looked young, younger than even the young interpol agent she’d been impersonating, and without even a shred of Kelso’s casual swagger and carefree smile. Her hair was shorter than Kelso’s, likely lengthened with the use of hair extensions to the proper length when she was in disguise, but it still hung in a dark curtain around her face. She’d gotten lucky with her impromptu target too– they both seemed to hail from Cauli by the features he could make out in the dim light.
She shifted, trying to raise her hands in mock greeting only for the chain binding them to the table to go taut with a definitive rattle.
“Pardon if I do not salute.” Her voice came out soft and even.
“You’re pardoned,” Robert said in the same sort of even tone. There was no need for a pretense between them.
Robert… Robert she looks really young. Is she older than a teenager?
Probably. Maybe. Does it matter?
“I see that you must have given them some serious trouble,” he continued.
“I broke an agent’s nose, and caused Agent Ash some trouble when she took my failsafes from me.”
The young woman’s pale eyes turned down towards her hands as she spread them as much as she was able to. She had a smattering of freckles across her face, easily hidden with a prosthetic or makeup, and strong shoulders. Despite her size, there was little doubt she was well honed.
“Have you come to finish me off, 13?”
“After I worked so hard to stop you from doing the job yourself? What would be the point?”
She didn’t seem to have an answer for that. Her fingers tightened as she shook her head. “It doesn’t make any sense…you know what they do to failed assets.”
“First hand,” he agreed. He leaned against the wall. Bobby was quiet– but Robert could feel his turmoil and anxiety clawing at the back of his mind. “But you didn’t finish the job, did you?”
The girl fell quiet, and he saw her fingers twitch in their bonds…a mirror of the nervous tic she’d affected as ‘Kelso’ without the object to match.
“I guess not.” she whispered. “our handler said it was a failure, and that I’d be corrected at the next safehouse.”
“That isn’t a surprise,” he shrugged. “If you’d gone for my head, we wouldn’t have been in this situation. I assumed it was 9. Surprised it was you.”
“……surprised it was me?” 24 went quiet again, fingers flicking in a gentle arc in the air. “Should I have gone for your head?” she finally asked.
Robert didn’t answer immediately. A flat yes or no wouldn’t do in the situation. They were used to dancing around a subject.
“You watched me put away my badge, didn’t you?” He touched the injured spot on his chest.
24’s intense eyes trailed down towards his chest, and she nodded once. “Bobby Fulbright was obvious in his movements and behaviors. It would be hard to miss, yes.”
“He certainly is.” Robert smiled a sly slice of a smile, indicating more to the subject. “And a hero, it seems. Saving lives. Apprehending suspects. Oh, wait. That’s Halblicht.”
24’s head slowly cocked to the side.
“I took my shot. I missed.” It was unlikely, from what he knew of 24, her marksmanship was considered expert, even with her young age. “So now here you are…Halblicht…the hero?”
“You missed, and here I am,” he nodded. “If you’d hit your target, you’d be off on your next mission. And if I let you finish yourself, you wouldn’t be here in this cell now. But here we both are.”
24’s fingers twitched again, and she seemed to try to bring them together instead of just fidgeting in the air…but the handcuffs went taut and her hands dropped to the table.
“They’ll execute me once they get the information they want. Nobody keeps a tool without a purpose,” 24 said without emotion “and you?”
“They’ve put me to use, as you can see here.” He spread his hands. “You could continue to be useful.”
What a cold way to put it.
It’s what she’ll understand, Bobby. If she understands it at all. She doesn’t have you in her head, whispering about breakfast sandwiches and ferris wheels.
Her hand raised, and caught the chain again, her lips turning slightly downward. “I tried to be useful…even after I aimed for your shiny badge instead of your head. He told me to take the Agent’s place to distract you while he escaped, and to terminate myself if I failed…that it was the only way I could be useful again.”
She shrugged gently “I was already considered broken when he left me to become Kelso…so what possible use could Interpol have with me?”
“Our skills seem to translate well to law enforcement,” he shrugged. “I’d speak on your behalf if you were interested.”
Her expression twitched just the slightest as a little more life entered her cold gray eyes and the attempt at a sleepy and casual smile etched across her face.
“You think you could? Really??” she asked with a shockingly genuine note of hope in her voice, only for it to stop with her hand raising towards her face as she composed herself. “I’m surprised they trust you enough to take your word on something like me, 13.”
The hope was gone, the tone smoothed out into the soft spoken deadpan she’d been using since the start.
December 25, 3:10 pm
Tyrell Badd had given Apollo Justice a lift to the station, and once the lawyer was in his viewing room, he met up with Sheila in the interpol viewing room.
Sheila’s eyes were locked on the screen, her lips tight and drawn as she kept her arms folded over her chest. It looked like she was trying to drill holes straight through it and into the prisoner on the other side.
It was only the sound of the door closing behind him that snapped her attention away with a softening of her expression “I was wondering when you’d show up, handsome.”
“Miss me that much?” he asked gruffly. She watched him take a lollypop out of his pocket and unwrap it. “Prosecutor asked me to drive Justice here, and the man was running a little late.”
“I guess Justice isn’t always on time,” Sheila said, before she broke out into a cackling laugh, her arms wrapping around herself as she rocked forward …and let herself bump against him with a wolfish smile. “But yes. I have. I was talking about you earlier and got disgustingly sentimental.”
“You? Sentimental?” He chuckled and put his arms over her shoulders.
“I know, right?” she pressed the back of her head against his stomach, looking up at him “maybe it’s the nostalgia of dealing with a spy. Indulge me?”
He put his hand on top of her head as she leaned on him. “If you insist,” he chuckled. “Must be pretty nostalgic for you, all things considered.”
“In a way, it is.” she laughed, though it lacked her usual fitfulness. “…I had to stop the girl from killing herself three times, I don’t think I was ever that bad.”
She waved her hand. “Have a seat, look at her with me.”
Tyrell pulled out a folding chair for her, and sat down in the one next to it. He watched the screen for a minute. “It’s weird, isn’t it?”
“You think so too, eh?” Sheila forwent sitting in her own chair to lean against his side and attempted to slip herself onto his lap. He didn’t stop her, instead sighing, and putting an arm around her. “…I can’t get my head around it. I knew something was wrong with Kelso when she checked in, but…’
“But this girl was scary fucking accurate. How.”
“Scary accurate. It took an intense back and forth with that team from LA for me to even be sure I didn’t make a mistake.” She pointed at the screen as the girl affected one of Kelso’s old faces. “…when I heard she’d taken the LA crew out to dinner at Kelso’s favorite local restaurant, I couldn’t believe it. There’s absolutely no way she could have learned that from some leaked Interpol dossier or profile. Not in the two days or so it’s been.”
“No way,” he agreed, shaking his head. He rolled his sucker between his fingers. “So how do you think she did it?”
“There’s the chance we have a mole in our midst feeding her information somehow…Halblicht had a miniature computer in his watch and sunglasses, it’s possible she had the same…but even then the personal data she brought up..” She grimaced. “right down to mimicking her sexuality. Something not in any file , and kept as private as can be.”
She leaned her head against his chest and he reached down and patted her as she continued.
“During the investigation, she started flirting at the young psychologist. And while I’d say ‘perhaps the spy also leans that way’, we know that’s not true. The people who come out of that facility don’t have preferences or opinions. They’re not allowed to.”
“Right. So it was part of the performance,” Badd grumbled. “And someone was feeding her note cards for her improv debut. Great. Now we gotta root somebody out.”
Sheila bit her thumbnail, her eyes hard as they watched the screen.
“I can’t think of any other explanation…the girl had hours…literal hours…to get into Kelso’s skin. Not just how she looked, but how she acted. There’s no way any organization, even one like theirs, can pull off that kind of deep cover so fast and so convincingly. I had my suspicions, but…it should have been obvious, not just suspicious.”
Badd held her close, and nodded, a stern, thoughtful expression on his face as he gazed at the screen.
“Yeah. That’s for damn sure. There’s something real fishy going on.”
December 25, 3:10 pm
Athena and Simon were getting comfortable in the viewing room– a small, bare office with a little table, a laptop, and some folding chairs– when the door opened again.
Apollo Justice slunk in, red coat hung around his shoulders.
Athena looked up with a bright smile, feeling her heart patter nervously in her chest.
“Apollo! Hey…ah…feeling a little better?”
He gave her a wan smile and held his hand up. His emotions were at least in check. The tension in him boiled at a low simmer.
“Apollo Justice is fine,” he promised.
“Glad to hear it, Justice-dono,” Simon drawled. “Thank you for joining us.”
“Prosecutor Blackquill.”
Athena let herself sink back into her chair, leaning on her hands.
“This should be interesting, huh? Apollo…that person in there opposite Halblicht is the girl behind the mask of Agent Kelso. You missed out on dinner with her the other day because of your flight, but suffice to say she seemed like any Interpol agent I’d ever known.”
Apollo settled himself in a chair in front of the screen and peered at her. “Nothing seemed off about her?”
“Not initially,” Simon agreed. “Though apparently Halblicht was suspicious of her from early on.”
“Not a surprise…Robert would know what signs to look for…the little tells hidden in her expressions. “
Athena’s eyes intently watched the girl as she shifted as much as the cuffs chaining her to the table would allow. “She even took us to a restaurant that she said was one of her favorites as a kid, and seemed friendly with the waitresses there…”
“Were any of her fellow agents around her?” Apollo asked, leaning on his hands.
“At the restaurant no…but Agent Ash drove us all to the scene and was there the whole time after.” Athena answered with a curious hum.
“Did she notice anything wrong?”
“She seemed suspicious…she’d apparently been suspicious since ‘Kelso’ checked in but she didn’t seem sure until the end…” She rubbed her neck. “and even if she laughed and laughed, she wasn’t happy about it either.”
“Huh.”
“Silence,” Simon said quietly, putting a finger to his lips. “They’re speaking.”
He turned up the sound on the screen, and they watched as Halblicht started his first overtures with the spy.
“Pardon if I do not salute.”
“You’re pardoned. I see that you must have given them some serious trouble,” he continued.
“I broke an agent’s nose, and caused Agent Ash some trouble when she took my failsafes from me.”
“Huh?” Athena’s brow furrowed as the agent spoke. Though most of the words that spilled from her lips carried nothing but the hissing static of she’d become accustomed to with assets of the organization when they clamped down on the emotions they weren’t supposed to have…around the middle she had picked up something.
A quivering but intense pulse of sadness and regret as she said ‘caused Agent Ash some trouble’
“Something surprising, Athena?” Simon asked.
“Have you come to finish me off, 13?”
“After I worked so hard to stop you from doing the job yourself? What would be the point?”
“It doesn’t make any sense…you know what they do to failed assets.”
“First hand. But you didn’t finish the job, did you?”
“I guess not.” she whispered. “our handler said it was a failure, and that I’d be corrected at the next safehouse.”
“That isn’t a surprise. If you’d gone for my head, we wouldn’t have been in this situation. I assumed it was 9. Surprised it was you.”
“Yeah…an incongruous emotion in her voice.” Athena put her hand to her chin and brought up Widget’s screen. She saw the faintest flicker of genuine confusion…and the briefest flicker of joy at Halblicht’s last sentence.
“……surprised it was me? Should I have gone for your head?” she finally asked.
“You watched me put away my badge, didn’t you?” He touched the injured spot on his chest.
“Bobby Fulbright was obvious in his movements and behaviors. It would be hard to miss, yes.”
“He certainly is. And a hero, it seems. Saving lives. Apprehending suspects. Oh, wait. That’s Halblicht.”
Apollo’s– Clay’s– spike of anger as he shifted in his chair at the exchange distracted her for a moment from what was happening on screen.
But still…Athena shifted closer, giving Clay the briefest smile before she inspected the woman’s face and listened to her reply.
“She…she’s feeling. In fits and bursts. I…” she murmured “he’s baiting her, and something’s happening.”
“I’m not seeing it, exactly,” Apollo murmured as they watched. “What do you mean?”
Simon, meanwhile, had laced his fingers together, and was watching the screen intently.
Athena tapped her ear “Every now and again there’s a spike of emotion…and there’s something like discord in her voice. Kind of…”
Her fingers hovered near the screen.
“There’s the low undercurrent, mostly nothing except for little pings of confusion and surprise…sadness. But every now and again we get a sudden surge of strong emotion, hidden in the flat affect. There was a sharp spike of sadness and something I’m pretty sure was regret when she was talking about giving Agent Ash a hard time. Happiness when Halblicht was surprised it was her , but only in a flicker…and then most interesting of all, in that last exchange…”
She rolled the mood matrix back while she watched the screen and hit play to display the dueling emotions of confused anger, and joyful curiosity. The anger was simmering low, but the joy and curiosity had spiked in a sharp arc.
“There’s definitely some sort of discord in there.”
“Now that’s interesting,” Simon murmured. “We know something about why Halblicht was so erratic. But why her…”
“That’s what I’m trying to figure out…” Athena bit her lip “Halblicht’s situation makes sense…we know why he’s erratic. But there’s no reason why she’d be…she’d only taken Kelso’s persona for a day and a half or so, with very little prep time.”
She rubbed her chin. “It could be just be that she’s younger…her mask slips a little easier?” even as she said it , it didn’t sound convincing. Not with the triggers for her strange and erratic bursts of emotion.
Apollo rubbed his bracelet and watched. “Huh.”
December 25, 3:20 pm
“I’m surprised they trust you enough to take your word on something like me, 13.” The hope was gone, the tone smoothed out into the soft spoken deadpan she’d been using since the start.
“The circumstances are unusual, I admit,” he said, adjusting his glasses. “The explanation might not make sense to you.”
Unusual doesn’t begin to cover it.
“I…” for a moment she strangely hesitated in a stammering of aborted sentences before she managed “I don’t need to make sense of it, a tool simply gathers information and dispenses it.”
She looked down at her chained hands with a sharp frown, before she looked up with something that was almost a plaintive smile. “…but I’m hoping you’ll try to explain it anyway?”
He smiled thinly back at her. “On the first level, I think you have heard of the concept of sympathy. You don’t believe in it, of course.”
“Of course” she nodded once, her dark hair falling in her face. “…I’ve heard of it.”
“They actually believe in it,” Robert said. “I’ve explained our situation, and it evokes sympathy from them. Makes them want to help us. Some of them, anyway.”
Bobby couldn’t believe how cold and how careful the exchange felt. It was never more brought home to them how deeply damaged that Robert and his fellow assets were, then watching them talk to one another. It was like any wrong word could set off a landmine.
The girl’s eyes briefly shot up to stare him down, and her fingers began twitching again, as if looking for something to fidget with and only finding the air.
“They’re sympathetic. Towards us?” She chuckled humorlessly. “I can’t understand why…we were made how we were made, they can’t change that. And with what we’ve done to them– they really want to help us?”
Her head tilted to the side. “Do you believe it?”
“I do,” he nodded. “It’s hard to. But I had a year to absorb it. To live among them. It’s… different. They’re different. Not everyone’s like our handlers.”
She smiled thinly at him “A year among them, and your heart starts beating like theirs. It’s an odd thing to watch. Heh…”
Her shoulders sagged with the closing of her eyes “Not everyone’s like our handlers, huh? Are some of them like Agent Kelso’s parents? Or Sheila Ash and Shi Long Lang, barking that nobody should be a number?”
“I would imagine so,” Robert said. “Some of them are very… kind. Warm. Funny.”
Hey– Robert– how long has she been acting as Kelso? It was only a day or two, right?
I believe so, yes. Since yesterday.
What would she know about Kelso’s parents?
December 25, 3:25 pm
Athena was in shock, her eyes glued to the screens as her fingers tapped through information as fast as she was receiving it, and her heart beat quicker behind her breast.
Every new line Robert drew out of Asset 24 brought a stranger reaction than the last…from a mingling of resigned despair with a warring undercurrent of something desperately hopeful. Excited and joyful even, as Robert talked about not everyone being like the handlers…as he talked about them and their sympathy.
The emotions ran simultaneously, yet completely at odds through her reply– and as soon as the words ‘Are some of them like Agent Kelso’s parents? Or Sheila Ash and Shi Long Lang, barking that nobody should be a number?’ left Asset 24’s lips, the mood matrix lit up in a chaotic pulse that flickered across her confused face.
“….wait, what?”
Athena, Simon and Apollo all looked at one another. It seemed they had the same question on their minds.
“Okay, Athena, Mr. Edgeworth told me how the case resolved. So… why is she talking about Kelso’s parents? Is it some kind of manipulation attempt?”
“I’m not sure what she’d be trying to manipulate him into, Justice-dono.”
“N..neither am I.” Athena frowned as she tried to click through the intense discord on her screen. “Halblicht knows her origin…he’s one of the few people here who can talk to her on a level she can relate to. Bringing up something like Kelso’s parents serves no purpose other than….that she knows about it?”
Her lips went tight. “…which is weird, isn’t it? Especially with this emotional reaction from the self described emotionless ‘tool’ . It’s not showing in her face…but the Mood Matrix is going crazy. ”
“It is weird,” Apollo said, rubbing his wrist. “Where’s she getting her information? Some kind of dossier?”
“I would imagine so,” Robert said. “Some of them are very… kind. Warm. Funny.”
“I guess some of them are.” 24 murmured as she looked up at Robert with a tired smile “not everyone’s an abyss like us. People like that don’t deserve to deal with things like us, let them be happy running their coffee shops and loving their daughters and fat old cats…let ‘em make dog jokes while getting a beer with the team for a job well done. They’re in a different world than us…so…so does it matter if they’re different than our handlers or not?”
“What dossier?” Athena asked “…the only thing she could have been using is in my pocket right now.”
Halblicht came closer toward her, and knelt down just beside her. “If you help them get to our handlers, you could be part of that world too. It’s a possibility. You’re interested– aren’t you?
Interested… there was that word again. Athena got the sense that it was a permitted word. They couldn’t want anything. But they could be interested.
It made sense…interest was a good sense for a spy to have. It wasn’t as personal as a want…it wasn’t a desire. It was an interest, and interest could serve the Organization.
She murmured as she leaned closer to the screen.
“….she’s registering more spikes of emotion now. Part of her feels desperate, too…and angry,. The other part’s terrified by the very idea.”
The girl seemed to stiffen on the screen, her wrists twisting in their bonds as the fidgeting worsened.
“We can’t get to them, Mr. Halblicht. They’ll erase us if we try” her voice sounded different from the soft and monotone voice she’d been using and more like the voice pleading her innocence on the highway hours ago.
“But…I’m interested in their world, I’m interested in being a part of it ag….” she seemed to hiccup…or maybe catch herself “against the judgment i’m allowed”
He reached out and put his hand on her hand. “They can’t make it worse than it’s already going to be if they catch us. Why not make the attempt to turn the dogs on them? It’s possible that we could escape into the world. There’s a chance. If you cooperate like I am.”
“Against?” Simon murmured quietly.
“That doesn’t feel right.” Athena murmured with him. “…she stopped herself from whatever she was going to say.”
Her eyes drew back to the mood matrix as the low and flickering half-emotion of fear struggled weakly in vain against the sudden rise of desperate, golden surprise and flashes of green excitement.
“It can’t be…that’d be impossible..”
Her shoulders shook on the screen, fingers visibly curling towards wrists layered with marks from fidgeting and twisting in the heavy metal shackles. Her hand shifted more against Halblicht’s as she turned a recently familiar smile towards him with the faint glisten of tears through the laptop’s camera feed.
“Damned if we do, damned if we don’t, Halblicht.” It finally dawned on Athena that she’d stopped using ‘number 13’ “it’s that or die…and dying fuckin’ hurts. I…” Her smile dropped and she seemed to tense all the more “I’ll cooperate.”