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like a phoenix bright

Chapter 3

Notes:

(See the end of the chapter for notes.)

Chapter Text

there’s a pigeon in the office.

it’s 8:37am. apollo has just walked in. mr wright is absent, as per usual. trucy is lounging on the client sofa scrolling through her phone. there is a pigeon napping on top of the filing cabinet.

trucy, he starts. stops. tries to figure out what he wants to ask. starts again. trucy, is the pigeon supposed to be there?

what? she replies, dragging her attention away from-- from whatever the new tiktok is. apollo doesn’t know. he’s a 24 year old lawyer, he fell out of touch like, 4 video platforms ago. 

the pigeon, he says, waving at the pigeon. it hasn’t so much as stirred. is that intentional?

she blinks. once, twice. oh, no, yeah. probably.

probably”?

well, i don’t think he’d have perched up there by accident, she says, as if that were a perfectly sensible response. good vantage point, maybe.

i-- trucy, just confirm for me that’s one of your magician birds and didn’t just, i don’t know, wander in off the street or something?

sometimes, she says, half-distracted by a cat video. when the hire birds don’t really get the tricks.

som -- y'know what? sure. fine. alright. the part-time pigeon lives there today. i’m not going to ask what it does the rest of the time. i’m not.

Notes:

further notes:

  • before miles finds out what phoenix is, he’s like 99% sure most of his memories of that kid are made up. there’s a point at which he’s convinced phoenix was an imaginary friend. surely no actual, real, human child would have done those things…
  • he’s doubly convinced nothing he remembers is real when he meets phoenix again in court bc like. man’s weird, but not that weird. most of miles’ prickliness here is bc phoenix acts like he remembers everything about their shared history and is super friendly, and miles is damn sure he remembers nothing and it’s Awkward
  • ….and then phoenix comes out with the weird childhood stories of his own accord and miles is like……………..oh. oh okay then. that was real, was it? probably finds out phoenix's deal in aa2.
  • larry was the first to find out besides phoenix’s parents, a year or two after dl6; he thinks it’s the coolest thing in the entire world and does his best to teach phoenix how to be human (for results of varying success)