CASE 001 ♞ [VIDEO]

[bratworth]

( The feed flickers on to a young man sitting at a table in the apartments in all of his courtroom finery. While he very much looks as though he's done his best to make himself as presentable as possible, there's no disguising the bags under his eyes. This is very much a man who has not had very a good night's sleep in a long time. )

Good morning. For those who I've not met before, my name is Miles Edgeworth. I was a prosecuting attorney from Los Angeles, California, in the United States of America on the planet Earth.

( Truly, what has his life come to that he has to make that clarification! )

I have been reflecting on the events that have occurred since our arrival on this planet, particularly during the festival. ( The plants had been bizarre and all, but he hadn't overly involved himself with them, having found other people more suited to what he has decided to consider extreme weeding. )

While I understand that the natives of this world might be more accustomed to free intimate contact between strangers, I consider it downright criminal that our food and drink at the festival might have been laced with substances that affect our behaviour without our knowledge or consent. If anyone suspects they may have consumed some of the contaminated items, I would be most interested in talking with you further.

Comments

Video

[bloodisthicker]

[...you know, somehow this doesn't surprise him at all given his previous encounter with Edgeworth...]

I'll admit, I wasn't terribly impressed with it myself. It may be common enough practice among the native Prismals that they don't actually bother informing about it, but... I feel like we didn't really get a proper orientation on what's actually expected behavior here, given that we've effectively had to puzzle out how certain aspects of society even works.

I don't really think we have proper representation thus far, and if we're going to be here any length of time, we could probably use it.

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[bratworth]

If there are to be more arrivals, the orientation could be greatly improved, I agree. ( And if there could be less wandering around on the moon, that would be even better! )

I'm willing to put together a compilation of people's testimonies of their experiences here, and present it to those who might be able to do something about it.

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[bloodisthicker]

Oh, definitely. Though... I will admit that I'm sympathetic on a very basic level, because I honestly do feel like I'd run into some of the same basic issues if a bunch of people from completely different worlds were dumped into Republic City. So it's definitely a good idea to bring our concerns to the government so that they actually do understand what counts as normal and abnormal for us and can improve things in the event that we somehow end up with more new arrivals.

As for my own experiences... personally, I didn't encounter any issues outside of the chocolate that made people really want to hold hands. I mostly got around it by shaking hands with people, which, well, I have a fair amount of experience with. Everything else would be hearsay, I suspect.

Video

[bratworth]

Do you think it likely that there will be more of us arriving?

( Still. Better safe than sorry! )

Yes, I've heard multiple reports about the effects of the chocolate fountain. You say that simply shaking hands alleviated the urges?

[bloodisthicker]

I don’t know how likely it is, but it’s rare that anything only ever happens once. I think it’s worth considering, at any rate, even if it doesn’t end up happening again in our lifetimes.

It seemed to be a good fix to me, though I only really tried it out secondhand. You might want to ask Cyrus how it turned out.

[bratworth]

( Cyrus... isn't that woman he helped take to the hospital? )

What do you mean you only tried it second-hand?

[bloodisthicker]

Oh, I mean that I wasn't under the chocolate's effects myself at the time, only the other person.

[bratworth]

Ah, I see. So you did not consume any of the chocolate yourself?

[bloodisthicker]

No, I didn't. I was a bit concerned about the sanitary aspect, honestly, so I tried not to partake.

[bratworth]

It was rather unsanitary, wasn't it? I've never been a fan of buffets and the like myself.

[bloodisthicker]

I feel like they’re fine with proper supervision, but I feel like they’re much riskier in a busy festival setting like that than they would be in a more sedate setting where someone could keep an eye on everything. I’m honestly kind of surprised no one took the opportunity to slip sedatives in there so they could rob a bunch of people blind, at the very least.

[bratworth]

( The corner of his mouth lifts upwards slightly. )

I suppose we must be thankful for small mercies. We have enough issues on our hands as it is.

[bloodisthicker]

Indeed, we do. Honestly, aside from the vines, things have been going remarkably smoothly in that regard...

[bratworth]

Did you have much interaction with the vines?

( Edgeworth had remained evacuated, because he knows where his skills are useful and where they are not. But he can't forget how he had seen the other man deal with the tentacle when they'd been trapped in the compatibility booth together. Surely tentacles and vines were similar enough... )

[bloodisthicker]

I like to think that I did a pretty good job of dealing with them. I could freeze them pretty easily because of their water content, so I tried to help a few people prevent their apartments from getting too overrun.

[Sometimes he just kind of forgets not everyone is from a world where people can casually manipulate the elements...]

...I still couldn’t do much about the smell, though...

[bratworth]

( There is so much to unpack here. )

What do you mean you could freeze the fines?

( Like, how is that even possible. Did he stuff them into a refrigerator?? )

The smell?

[bloodisthicker]

...oh, right, I keep forgetting who I haven’t explained this to. I can control water, basically. Don’t worry about it.

[maybe he should just type up an explanation he can hand people...]

And yes, the vines smelled kind of awful once they all died.

[bratworth]

( That makes sense. Dead things to tend to smell terribly... but most importantly, what does he mean, don't worry about it? )

You make it sound so simple.

[bloodisthicker]

It’s a pretty common ability back where I’m from, so I don’t really consider it that strange. Admittedly I needed years of training to do it well and a genetic predisposition to be able to do it at all, so I guess the idea of worlds where elemental bending isn’t actually a thing isn’t that strange.

[bratworth]

( Ah. )

So it has something to do with your genes? Having this... ability at all?

[bloodisthicker]

Something like that, yes... so if your family’s from the North or South Pole like mine is, you’re part of the Water Tribe and if your parents or grandparents or some ancestors were waterbenders, you can be born one, too. The same works for earthbenders and firebenders and their respective nations, too.

Granted, the actual science isn’t too strong on how it works, especially now that there’s more travel between the nations so you get more families where a waterbender might marry an earthbender or something and their kids can be either or just non-benders. Also, you’d think there would be some people out there with Air Nomad ancestry who’d be able to pull it off, but it’s just a few descendants of the last surviving airbender right now...

...oh. Wait. That was too much information, wasn’t it...

[bratworth]

( So much information, but there's rarely such a thing as 'too much information' when it comes to Edgeworth, unless such information is irrelevant and thus a waste of time. There's certainly a lot to process here, that's for sure. )

No, it's fine.

( Must be some sort of ill-explained genetic mutation. Edgeworth supposes he can live with that. )

So, you said your family is from one of the poles? Doesn't it get very cold there?

( Assuming all planets work like Earth. Don't look at him, he's a lawyer, not an astronomer, ok. )

[bloodisthicker]

Oh, absolutely. Fortunately, our waterbending makes it much easier to use the ice and snow to our advantage rather than our detriment in terms of transportation, architecture, hunting, and so forth, so it’s not as bad as it might be if we didn’t actually exist.

Admittedly, it’s still a pretty rough existence if you don’t live in one of the larger settlements. I was pretty happy to move from the boonies to the capital, myself.

[bratworth]

Is this capital located on one of the poles as well?

( Now that he's starting to wrap his head around the concept of other planets at all, he's finding that there's so much to learn about them... )

[bloodisthicker]

Yes, it is.

[it's so fuckin cool right...]

The North Pole is kind of a spiritual center, so the city essentially sprung up around it.