Trucy stayed with her father for the rest of the day and all night too, sleeping in a spare hospital bed. The doctors and nurses all fussed over her and she performed a few tricks for them, but her trademark smile didn’t appear until Phoenix was out of danger.

True to form, Phoenix Wright had been incredibly lucky. The bullet hit him a few inches above his heart, meaning that it avoided the major arteries, but he’d still lost a lot of blood.

His survival was mostly attributed to Doctor Bludden Guts, who had removed the bullet before the wound could be infected. Trucy, Athena, Apollo and the others had all wanted to thank Gutts for his bravery, but he’d left the morgue after Phoenix was transferred to ER and he didn’t come in to work the next morning.

Ema, who had secured the diamond as well as apprehending Druges, was awarded a medal for her bravery, but she was more interested in solving the case than posing for photographs. She tracked down the original owner of the diamond and made a full report which she gave to Athena.

A week later, on the day that Mr Druges’ retrial was due to take place, Phoenix was discharged from hospital. He refused to stay at home, so Trucy accompanied him to the defendant’s lobby.

“It feels strange to still be defending him after what he’s done,” Athena said. The bags under her eyes, barely concealed by her make-up, were the only evidence of how stressful this particular trial had been. “Knowing that he’s guilty and that I didn’t see it.”

“This time, you’re not trying to prove that he’s innocent,” Mr Wright reminded her. He was standing on crutches, wobbling a little, but otherwise perfectly fine. “Look for the reasons why he did what he did, and make sure that the verdict Druges gets is fair. That’s all you can do.”

“I can’t believe you can be so detached,” Apollo said. “He almost killed you!”

“I’ve defended a lot of clients over the years and not all of them were innocent,” Mr Wright replied. “Sometimes, we just have to let the prosecutors do their jobs.”

Although she seemed to be cheered by his advice, Apollo noticed that Athena refused to make eye contact with Mr Druges, who was already fidgeting on the witness stand when they entered the courtroom. He couldn’t blame them; every time he looked at the man, he was forced to relive that moment when they’d entered the morgue to see Phoenix bleeding out on the ground.

Phoenix and Trucy waved to them from the gallery, which went some way towards soothing his nerves. The Judge also enquired after their health and commended them for their bravery before Ema took the stand as the first witness for the prosecution.

“We managed to find out where the diamond came from,” she said, without preamble. “It wasn’t stolen, like we originally thought. The defendant bought this diamond with his own credit card.”

“That gives us an incredibly strong motive,” Blackquill said. “Mr Druges gave this diamond to Miss City, then he found out that she was having an affair, something we have confirmed with several of her friends. They argued and he demanded that she return the diamond, but she swallowed it. He had to kill her to get it back.”

“That doesn’t explain everything.” Athena spoke up. The courtroom fell silent and she looked as if she was regretting her outburst, but Apollo nodded encouragingly. “If he killed her during an argument, it would be a crime of passion, but Miss City was poisoned. That suggests premeditation.”

“Do you have another explanation for her death, Cykes-dono?” Blackquill replied, not as sarcastically as usual. He appeared to be genuinely interested and Apollo whispered into her ear with a new idea.

“The defense would like to call a witness,” she said. “Doctor Bludden Gutts, from the Healsome Hospital morgue.”

A short recess was called while Doctor Gutts was summoned back to the court. He looked nervously out at the gallery from the witness stand, even more dishevelled than he’d been the last time they saw him. His black hair stood on end, without any gel in it this time, and his ginger roots were showing.

“I- I don’t understand what I’m doing here,” the doctor said, fidgeting with the long sleeves of his black robes. “I’ve already testified once - once before about Miss City’s body and it wasn’t exactly a success.”

“You’re a good man, doctor.” Apollo said, taking over for a moment. “You might have made a misjudgement in your font size, but your autopsy has turned out to be the key element of this case. Not to mention that you saved the life of our boss last week.”

The doctor’s face flushed pale and a rosy blush spread over his cheeks as the gallery erupted in applause. Usually, the Judge wasn’t very tolerant of their participation in trials, but this time, he joined in by banging his gavel loudly.

“Thank you, Apollo, that’s very kind.” The doctor smiled widely and he shivered at the man’s sharp teeth, stained with red flecks of what he assumed was ketchup. For a medic, he was strangely unconcerned by dental hygiene. “I’m ready to answer any questions you might have.”

“Was the container of poison recovered from the crime scene?” he asked.

“Yes, indeed it was. I put that in my footnotes.” The doctor pulled out a magnifying glass and studied the tiny font. “Only Mr Druge’s fingerprints were recovered from it…”

“Surely that’s just more evidence to back up my theory,” Blackquill interjected, but the doctor carried on speaking over him.

“I found that strange, because the fingerprints were in strange positions on the vial. If you wanted to pick it up, you’d hold it in your thumb and forefinger, but Mr Druges seems to have held the vial with his little finger somehow.”

“Do you have an explanation for this?” Athena asked Druges without looking at him and no one was surprised when he just folded even deeper into himself. “How about you, Doctor Gutts? What do you think this means?”

The doctor smoothed back his hair, but it sprang straight back up. “The only explanation I can think of is that Mr Druges here was set up. Someone could have put his fingers around the vial to make it look like he was the only one who touched it.”

At that, Athena straightened up and her eyes widened suddenly, like a lightbulb had been switched on inside her head.

“Who would have the motive, means and opportunity to kill Miss City?” she asked, pacing up and down. “We looked into all of her friends and colleagues, I have their statements here. Simon, would you read out the one from her best friend?”

“Miss Chattie Gossip told us that Miss City had been low recently and we put that down to the stress of concealing her affair.” Blackquill raised his eyebrows at Athena, who simply grinned. “Cykes-Dono, you are not suggesting...!”

“According to the autopsy report, Doctor Gutts, you found Xanex in her system?” Athena continued and Gutts nodded. “She was being medicated for severe depression, wasn’t she, yet this was never brought up before.”

“What’s going on?” asked the Judge. “Is this line of questioning leading anywhere?”

“I propose that Miss Toxi City committed suicide and set up the scene so that Druges would be blamed for her death!” Athena exclaimed. There was a deathly silence in the courtroom and Apollo stared at Mr Druges in shock. Talk about a turnabout trial!

“Miss City waited until she knew that he was home alone, watching TV, knowing that he’d have no alibi,” she said. “She had already prepared the vial by taking his fingerprints while he slept. All she had to do was poison herself with his special, unique poison and he’d be blamed.”

“As for motive, he’d found out about her affair and dumped her.” Blackquill continued. “We looked into her finances too – all her money came from him and she was deep in debt. She must have wanted to ruin him with her death, to make sure that he’d rot in jail, unable to be happy without her in his life.”

“I escaped from court during the last trial because I thought no one would believe my story.” Everyone turned to see Druges drawn up to his full height, tears staining his cheeks.

“All I could think about was the diamond. I could steal it from the morgue and use the money to escape the country. I got my gun from my apartment and drove straight to the hospital. I wasn’t thinking rationally, my mind had gone, and when I saw that someone was already in the morgue, I lost control of myself. I shot someone! I’m so sorry!”

He raised his hands in the air and the bailiffs rushed forwards, but he was just sobbing uncontrollably. They escorted him outside, but not before the Judge issued his verdict.

“For the murder of Miss Toxi City, not guilty. But for the attempted murder of Mr Phoenix Wright, Mr Druges, I pronounce you guilty and sentence you to ten years imprisonment.”

They met up with Doctor Gutts and the others in the defendant’s lobby after the trial and Trucy finally got a chance to thank him for saving her father’s life.

“What are you going to do now?” Apollo asked him. “Back to the morgue?”

“Actually, I’m going to retrain so that I can work in the ER again,” the doctor replied. “I’ve hated myself ever since the victim of the car crash died in my care, but being able to make a difference to someone’s life again has made me want to heal living people again.”

“That’s wonderful!” Trucy grinned, throwing her arms around him in a hug.

Gutts stood there awkwardly, but ruffled her hair and some of the tension drained from his face. He looked almost normal for once and Apollo hoped that something good would come of the terrible day when they’d unwittingly put Mr Wright in danger.

“What do you say I treat you all to ketchup sandwiches?” Gutts asked, smiling another sharp-toothed smile.

“I’m in!” Phoenix said immediately, pulling Trucy close to him. “To have someone else paying for once will be a real treat!”

“Us too!” Athena joined in, winking at Apollo.

Part of him felt like objecting: he had so much work to do, he’d left the agency to get dirty over the last few days and he hadn’t even glanced at the files for his next case. But then he looked at the people around him, still smiling despite the hardships they’d experienced over the last week.

“I’m in,” he said, following Gutts out of the courthouse, into the blazing sun. “Just tell me there’s other food options available…”

“Of course, there are onion sausage rolls too and cheese puffs, they even have a help-yourself bowl of applesauce!”

The lawyers all looked at each other, then at Doctor Gutts. Then, as one, they all shouted:

“OBJECTION!”

THE END