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I'm bored out of my fucking skull and there is no hope of any relief before next Tuesday. I guarantee nothing, but I am open for prompting for shortfics if people are interested in that. We don't have to be in each other's circles or whatever.

ETA 8/15 Matters have not improved. Still open for business.

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From:

shinon

The princes are twelve, and they are In Trouble. The precise nature of this trouble hasn't been communicated to the staff, but both boys are on loan to the kitchen for the day, and His Majesty said, meaningfully, that no task can be too tedious.

Sabin is turning a crank handle and humming tunelessly under his breath. Sabin is a good kid. If he seems to be enjoying himself more than he is Being Punished and Learning His Lesson, no one is likely to snitch on him.

Edgar isn't taking it so quietly. "This is pointless. You could just motorize it." When no one acknowledges him, he says, "I could motorize it. We have parts. Sabin, watch mine for me -"

"Your Highness," says the apprentice cook whose job this would normally be, "if you leave with it half done the ice will melt."

"So I'll get more."

"And it has to be done within the hour, so it can chill until the banquet."

Edgar looks at Sabin, still patiently churning, no help at all. Then he turns back to the apprentice cook, looking shrewd. "Fine. I'll build this machine in five minutes. Tell me something." He leans forward. "Do we not have rat dogs for the stables?"

Reports afterward are consistent: in the disaster that ensued, Sabin never left his post.

*

"Sabin," Edgar says. They're twenty-eight, and along with the rest of the world's population, they are in trouble on a wholly different scale. But set that aside for now. "You didn't."

Sabin shrugs. He looks a little too guileless. "It's my signature dessert. It comes together easy, too."

Edgar lunges at him - seventy percent joking, thirty percent mortified. Or some less exact ratio. "You do not have a signature dessert, you little -"

Sabin holds him off. "Aside from the ingredients, all you need is two buckets, ice, salt, a crank -"

Further attempts at grappling. "I'm warning you -"

"An excited little dog, a thirty-foot leash, only as much animal handling experience as your average twelve-year-old prince -"

Alerted by the sounds of a scuffle, Terra hurries over. "Is something wrong?"

"Hi, Terra. No, everything's fine. Did Edgar ever tell you about the time he got half-frozen custard exploded all over the castle kitchen?"

Edgar, by now physically overpowered, puts in a valiant "The principle was sound!"

"Um," she says. "No. But the ice cream turned out really nice, Sabin. Thank you for making it."

"Of course! It's my signature."

Edgar says something that sounds like, but surely isn't, "Smartass."

From:

queenlua

prompt: at least one defense attorney, at least one shitty restaurant

From:

queenlua

prompt: at least one dinky mage, at least one mushroom

From:

flonnebonne

After the events in the Magitek factory, what the heck happens to Celes?

From:

shinon

Even sealed, the evidence bag bears a whiff of burnt hair. The client stands accused of tampering with the wiring in the victim's kitchen to start an electrical fire; the defense's theory is the wiring was shitty when it was run, no foul play needed. The circuit just couldn't handle a stand mixer, an ice cream maker, and a blender simultaneously, when the dishwasher was already running. Whatever a person could even make that needed all three appliances at once.

"You know what I think?" says Trucy, and Apollo looks over expecting her to say something about, who knows, lemon cake-batter ice cream? But she says, "That burnt-hair smell always makes me want a meatball sub."

"What."

"There was this dinky little Italian place Daddy and I used to go to, in a shopping mall, across from a hair salon -"

From across the office, Athena says, "You guys still have malls?"

Trucy says, "It was delicious."

Apollo says, "With the smell of burnt hair?"

"You know, for the longest time, I just thought that was what red pepper flakes smelled like?"

Unbelievable. Apollo returns to his study of the evidence. It's only a minute or two later that he notices Athena is standing over him. He looks up. "Don't you have a case to -"

"So when are we going?"

It's not an argument he'll win, so he decides not to have it.

*

There is a real-live mall. There is a real-live crummy little Italian joint, next to the saddest fountain you've ever seen in your life, across from a yoga studio.

"Oh, bummer," Athena says, "we're not getting the full burnt-hair experience." And orders veal marsala.

Apollo sputters, "You can't do that."

"Can't do what?"

"You trust this place with veal?" The vinyl seating of their booth is cracked, leaking stuffing and patched with duct tape. He can't see any equipment in the kitchen but a pizza oven and an elderly refrigerator. He says, "We're in a mall. And did you see the storefront? That lot next door has been empty since it was a Blockbuster!"

Patiently Athena says, "Blockbuster is not real and can't hurt you."

"Look, if your super-hearing picks up on any rat activity -"

"Oh, all the time."

"Not encouraging, Athena!"

And yet, in this unencouraging place, Apollo Justice proceeds to have the best meatball parm of his life. Worse, with Athena around, he can't even pretend it's not.

Small consolation: she can't lie to him either. After her second bite she puts her fork down saying, "So, I don't personally know what asbestos tastes like -"