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Author's Chapter Notes:

So, it took quite a while, but with the help of a major contributing user over on Writing.com, I've got a new Ace Attorney shrinking story to present! I hope you all enjoy it.

"Maybe it's a weather machine! We could sure use some sun right about now!"

Maya circled around to the back side of the large machine to look it over yet again. Phoenix remained where he was, looking up at the device with a thoughtful expression.

The pair had been holed up in the dark basement of a rather forgettable-looking old building for nearly an hour now. As was so often the case when the pair visited a new location, the basement appeared to be the scene of a recent murder.

The client they were to represent in the case was a somewhat scatterbrained scientist in her late thirties. Her name was Airie Xemple, though Maya had already managed to forget it two or three times since they had first met with her. The building belonged to an old colleague of Dr. Xemple’s, whose apparent murder was causing quite a stir in the scientific community. The police were no longer particularly active in the building by this point in the day, leaving defence attorney Phoenix Wright and his close friend and assistant Maya Fey a reasonable amount of freedom to examine the scene. Dr. Xemple claimed total innocence in her colleague's murder, and she seemed sincere enough for Phoenix's Magatama, so he'd set off for the dingy old building with Maya at the earliest opportunity.

 

Phoenix turned away from the strange machine in the centre of the room, which he and Maya had been examining for a while now, as he heard a noise from the stairwell leading back up to ground level.

 

"Hmph. I cannot say I am surprised to see you here, Mr. Phoenix Wright."

Startled by the new arrival’s familiar voice, Maya muttered something rather rude. Prosecutor Franziska von Karma arrived at the bottom of the stairs, giving Phoenix an impatient glare.

"I suppose that in your foolish world, preserving the crime scene is of little importance." the prosecutor snapped as Maya stepped back from the large machine.

"We’re just as careful as you are, Ms. von Karma." Phoenix replied, hopeful that he might, for once, avoid doing anything to anger the short-tempered prosecutor.

"Hmmph. See that you are. The perfect investigation cannot abide foolish, troublemaking fools risking damage to the evidence." was Franziska's retort.

"I really appreciate your faith in us." Maya interjected, her approach to this conversation immediately demonstrating considerably less caution. “Guess we’ll just have to share the space down here.”

“Maya…” Phoenix sighed, remembering the many painful experiences he’d had in the past when interacting with Franziska on a crime scene. The whip the perfectionist prosecutor insistently carried around wasn’t just for show.

 

--------

 

 

The investigation remained tense for some time to follow. Franziska made no small effort to repeatedly express her disdain for Phoenix's particular habits related to collecting evidence from the scene, but without any police around to blockade their progress, he and Maya were able to inspect the basement with little obstruction.

Another twenty-five minutes had passed when Maya opted to leave and find a burger stand, hoping to buy something to eat. This, of course, left Phoenix alone with Franziska. He wasn't terribly interested in trying to speak with her about the case.

 

Something noteworthy was beginning to occur, though neither noticed. When Maya left the basement, she bumped into the large machine she'd been so fascinated by earlier on, while edging her way past Phoenix.

The machine itself was beginning to emit a low hum as Phoenix and Franziska continued their own individual inspections of the room's many contents.

About a minute in, the hum became quite noticeable.

"Hmm...?" Phoenix turned to check for the source of the noise.

 

--------

 

Franziska was about to make another impatient remark as she heard Phoenix's voice. She only just managed to look up in time as the still-unidentified machine let off a deafening sound for a split-second.

Phoenix staggered back with a yelp.

"… It was only a sound." Franziska chided, smirking slightly at her opponent's nervousness. Her smirk faded as she watched Phoenix scrambling back toward the wall. "Is something bothering you, Mr. Ph-..."

Her voice trailed off.

 

Phoenix had good reason to look so distressed; as the large machine settled down, a dim glow had appeared around Phoenix's body. It enveloped him completely as he frantically writhed in place, clearly not comfortable with this development.

 

Franziska took a slow step toward him and something else caught her attention. She was several inches shorter than Phoenix, so why was her eye level now over his head, when he was still standing?

"H-help-!!" Phoenix stammered, looking at her in a panic.

"Are you-..." Franziska didn’t finish the question, but she found her answer as she continued to observe the scene.

Phoenix was getting smaller. Shrinking. And the process was accelerating.

 

--------

 

Hoping to free himself from the strange glow around his body, Phoenix tried to step toward Franziska. He stumbled and nearly fell.

He was barely half her height now. Franziska could only watch in astonishment as Phoenix's stature dwindled further and further.

"H-help me-!!" he sputtered again.

 

By now Franziska had to stoop down to see what Phoenix was doing clearly.

Nearly a minute after the glow first appeared, it began to fade. Phoenix was still struggling to escape whatever discomfort he was experiencing. He'd barely made it halfway toward Franziska with his size continuously decreasing.

 

At last, it seemed to stop. The sickly glow around the defence attorney's body was gone, and he looked to be finished shrinking.

Franziska could only see this, however, because she'd lowered herself down onto one knee to continue examining him.

 

In barely a minute, Phoenix Wright had gone from a ways short of six feet tall to somewhere in the vicinity of two inches tall.

 

Watching the bizarre scene before her as it gradually unfolded, Franziska's mind had been occupied by quite a frantic series of wildly varying thoughts.

She had just watched Phoenix Wright being reduced from his ordinary height, standing a good several inches over her, to what looked like two inches off the ground at best.

The defence attorney was now left on the basement's floor, barely tall enough to even clear the toe section of her tall boots.

Down on one knee to continue observing this strange occurrence up close, Franziska barely knew what to say.

She heard a small voice. Was he trying to speak to her?

She turned her head slightly, and from there, could make out his panicked words. His voice sounded incredibly strange in this state.

"- some way to help me... could you get me off of this floor, at least?"

She paused. After a moment's consideration, a thin smile appeared on her lips. Turning back to look at the puny attorney on the floor, she lowered one hand and allowed him to climb up onto her palm. His movements felt strange against her black leather glove.

She rose to her feet, carrying him up. What was she supposed to do with him now? By all appearances, that strange machine he'd bumped into had caused this, but could it reverse the change?

... If Franziska was honest with herself, she wasn't sure she actually wanted to fix this situation quite yet. Hearing Phoenix's pleas, she'd briefly considered the idea of trying to study the strange machine for herself and attempt to reverse its effects, but at the same time, this situation presented the kind of opportunity she'd never experienced before since meeting the frustrating defence attorney.

 

But what do with him, now that she had him? The possibilities were rather extensive...

A noise sounded from somewhere behind her, making her turn around. She thought that Phoenix might have been trying to speak to her again as well, but she wasn't listening.

"Nii-iick!"

The smile on her face faded a bit. Maya Fey was returning. This would make it considerably harder for her to take advantage of Phoenix's sudden reduction in size, unless...

Her lips curled into a proper smirk. She'd just gotten an entirely new idea.

 

Maya's footsteps were coming back down into the basement room.

"Niiiick," she called out again, "I've got you your sandwich! Did you want to-..."

Stopping a few steps from the floor, Maya trailled off, looking around the room in surprise.

"Uh..." She looked to Franziska, who had quickly hidden Phoenix in her closed fist, pressing it against her side. "Where did-..."

"Phoenix Wright needed to step out for a phone call." Franziska lied, keeping her voice level. "I don't think he will have gone far."

Her mind was abuzz with the effort to determine what best to do here. It might prove difficult to continue concealing the shrunken defence attorney from the notice of his assistant.

"Oh." Maya looked down at the bag she was carrying. It was from a nearby food stand, by the look of it. "Well, I don't really wanna carry his chicken sandwich around all day, so is it OK if I just leave this stuff here for a sec' while I go and find him?"

 

Franziska blinked, thinking it over.

"If you must." she said, waving her free hand. "So long as you aren't foolish enough to make a mess of the crime scene."

Maya shrugged. "That'd be kinda hard to do." she said. With that, she set the bag down on an empty shelf right beside the stairs and turned, heading back up.

 

Once Maya was gone, Franziska moved into action. She approached the shelf where Maya had just left the bag, a new goal in mind.

 

--------

 

Phoenix awkwardly wriggled in the grip of Franziska's leather glove. What the hell was she doing? He'd just heard Maya out in the room somewhere, but it sounded like she'd left again.

He could hear some kind of rustling noise now.

At last, his view opened up again, and he looked on in confusion. Franziska was holding a foil-wrapped burger in her other hand. Maya's, he had to guess. What was she doing...?

She spoke up, and he squirmed in place, trying to see her face. It loomed over him in ominous fashion, and her smirking expression made him shiver.

"Your assistant, Maya Fey, is a bit of a glutton, isn't she?" Franziska remarked. Phoenix wasn't sure of what she was getting at. "Eating something like this," she went on, lightly flicking the wrist of the hand holding Maya's burger, "Do you think she would notice if it contained... an extra ingredient?"

Phoenix blinked, still not understanding what Franziska's point was. She wasn't just judging Maya's eating habits, was she? Sure, Maya ate a fair bit more than was probably reasonable, and she did love her burgers, but...

He made a startled noise as Franziska used two fingers to pry the burger's top bun loose. The motion exposed the nice-looking leaf of lettuce it contained, resting on top of a generous slice of cheese topping the beef patty.

"Uhh..."

Franziska gave a quiet laugh.

"Actually, I think I might like to order one of these for myself... perhaps you could judge this one for me, Phoenix Wright?"

"Wha-..."

Phoenix's response went silent as Franziska suddenly began to move him. His eyes widened in alarm, watching as Maya's burger suddenly drew closer. Was Franziska going to...

 

“Ack-...!"

Warmth swept over Phoenix as the prosecutor holding onto him suddenly forced him headfirst into the gap between the burger's lettuce leaf and the layer of cheese. He was blinded, getting a faceful of a sauce coating that was spread across the cheese slice. Franziska's fingers pushed him forward, and he slid helplessly along the damp surface until she'd forced him inside of the burger entirely.

He gagged, a mouthful of (admittedly delicious) sauce almost making him choke.

What the hell was Franziska doing this for? He was surrounded by intense warmth, the freshly-grilled burger creating a sweltering environment all around him.

Ahead, the lettuce and heavy top bun above him lifted away, and he blinked, trying to get the sauce out of his eyes. He could see Franziska again.

"Hm. I think you look right at home, Phoenix Wright." she said in a mocking voice. "I wonder what Maya Fey might think, if she learned that her defence attorney friend had become part of her lunch?"

His stomach lurched. Was she serious...? She couldn't actually be planning to try and trick Maya into eating him, could she...!?

There wasn't time to ask. Franziska snapped the top bun back down again, and Phoenix's world went dark. He wriggled, but the burger's numerous layers were nearly impossible for him to shift.

He could feel sauce dripping down his face from his hair.

 

--------

 

Franziska stowed the burger away again and stepped back out into the middle of the room, satisfied. This would be entertaining, no doubt.

 

After a minute or so, Maya returned again, a confused frown on her face.

"You're sure Nick didn't say he was going off anywhere?" she inquired. "I don't see him. Like, anywhere."

Keeping her cool, Franziska shook her head briefly. "I don't claim to understand what goes on in the foolish mind of your foolish friend, Maya Fey."

Maya made an irritated noise.

"Well, thanks, anyway. His sandwich is gonna get cold, but I guess that's his fault."

Franziska watched, trying not to make herself conspicuous, as Maya reached into the food bag and withdrew her burger. It didn't look like she'd noticed anything off about it.

 

--------

 

The world was shifting again. Phoenix felt a horrible sense of dread. He could tell that someone was picking up the burger again, but there was no way to spot who it was.

If it was Maya, then he was going to be in serious-

"AAGH-!!"

He let out the terrified yell in response to a sudden powerful impact just in front of him. Squirming backward out of reflex, still pinned inside of the burger, he took in the rather alarming sight of a huge set of teeth in front of him, which had just cleaved a sizeable chunk out of the burger. He shuddered as a soft, plush lip brushed over his cheek. Maya had just taken a very large first bite, and she'd almost taken his head off with it.

"M-Maya...!!" he gasped, his mouth feeling very dry. "MAYA, HELP...!!"

He had been lowered away from his friend and assistant's huge face, and watched her jaw at work, chewing on the first bite of her burger. Had she heard him?

A single crumb tumbled from Maya's lips and past his position, and he found his voice again.

“MAYAAA!!"

With the first chunk of the burger gone, he could work his arms free. He was tired from struggling, but pushed them forward all the same, waving a hand in the air to try and draw Maya's attention. Her brown eyes weren't pointed in his direction...

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