tvk | 0011000100110011 (Accidental Video)

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0011000100110011 (Accidental Video)

*It's the middle of the night, a good bit after Dark Hour, but Allen isn't asleep. His phone is recording him sitting at his desk, the glow of both his heavily modified desktop computer and a futuristic holographic screen providing most of the lighting. But even in the low light, it's easy to tell that something's eating at him.*

What the hell did I even mention that out loud for? As if the dreams weren't bad enough already...it's almost like I wasn't even thinking before I spoke up.

*He shakes his head and shuts down the holoscreen before grabbing a pot of coffee off of his desk and topping off a mug of the stuff.*

But why that, of all things? Dammit, this is just what I need...

*He rubs his forehead, then starts emptying packets of sugar into the coffee as the phone flicks off.*

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It's...yeah, they're pretty bad. But I can manage, so don't worry too much, especially if you have nightmares of your own to deal with.

Not anymore. Learning the truth behind the event that inspired it resulted in its gradual disappearance. [...yawn.]

I don't think that's really going to help with me, since I already know all about what happened then. Even finding out it was a Dive all along...it doesn't change what happened when I didn't know.

Is this the Dive you mentioned in which a friend's traumatic experience was brought to light?

Yeah, but...not that part. There was actually a lot to it, since it drew from a lot of people's memories.

(The specifics are probably best left unexplored. However...)

How could one find oneself in such a situation without realizing it?

It's...a complicated story. Normally, there's at least some machinery involved in visiting someone's subconscious, but some of our enemies were pretty powerful. They arranged things so that we would be transported into her subconscious domain even without the equipment.

So as far as we knew, one minute KOS-MOS-ah, that's an android my division at the company I used to work at built. One minute KOS-MOS was about to be destroyed, and the next we were on another planet, fifteen years in the past.

How is it that you came to realize where you were at all?

After Sh-er, my friend saw the truth of what happened back then, one of the people who set it up came and explained where we were. He wanted her to trust him...to think he was the only one who could help her deal with what it meant. He wanted her to think that we couldn't help her at all, and he could save her life.

*His hands are clenching in anger now. Whoever this man is, Allen has a severe problem with him.*

To take advantage of someone in their moment of vulnerability... I'm all too familiar with that technique.

["This is the true face of the defense attorney, boy -- no better than the criminals they defend."]

It's a dirty one...but it works pretty well. I-we almost lost her to him. She even fought against us.

Fought in what way?

[Perhaps a question he shouldn't have asked, but drilling someone like this is a simple defense mechanism for someone whose comfort zone is behind a prosecution bench.]

Literally. I refused to fight her and would have been useless against him, but for a while, she was more willing to attack her friends than to believe that he could be manipulating her.

For that to have been the case despite your apparent presence, he must have been remarkably convincing.

He was her ex-fiance, who supposedly died protecting her three years ago. When it comes right down to it, he was making her choose between her friends and family and the man she wanted to marry, who saved her life and came back from the dead to do it again.

[And that touches a nerve, causing Edgeworth's voice to firm in response.]

Did she have any reason to believe he was who he seemed to be?

Not enough at first if you ask me, since he'd proven himself that Testaments can look like whoever the hell they want.

*Okay, deep breath, Allen. Deep breath.*

But...he knew her too well to not be someone from her past, and all three of the others had some connection to someone in our group, too.

For that to be the case, I assume the level of knowledge they displayed was too intimate to merely be a master spy's work? After all, if these "Testaments" possessed the capability for disguise you cite, they would be well-suited to information-gathering.

*Was that a bit of distaste in his voice at the mention of using powers like that for information gathering, or just Edgeworth's ears playing tricks on him?*

Unless he'd been following her invisibly for over three years...and by the time it all ended, it was pretty obvious he really was who he claimed.

I see.. Do you know what his motive was for such an act?

He needed her cooperation. The Testaments weren't acting on their own. They were working for a guy called Wilhelm, and he was...you'd have to ask one of them for the exact details, but he wasn't human and never was. He knew the universe was eventually going to end and was trying to prevent that, but...

*His voice tenses and the 'clunk' of him setting his coffee down harder than is strictly necessary can be heard.*

Instead of trying to actually stop it, he decided that the only way to save the universe was by reversing time, back to the start of everything. Among other things, he needed her abilities and a pendant she carried to do that.

[And this is several seconds of bewildered silence.]

Heh... *The most mirthless laugh.* I know, that would have been my reaction if someone had tried to explain it to me a year ago. Ultimately, it all comes down to a matter of opinion. He thought he was doing the only thing that could save the universe and we thought he was wrong and sacrificing too much for it. That's...all there really is to it.

...It would seem that you're used to bearing burdens far greater than those I'm used to.

It was mostly my friends, actually. All I really did was figure some things out and convince her that she shouldn't side with the Testaments.

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