Author's Note: Last chapter! I hope that everyone enjoyed the story, and thank you so much to those who reviewed. Spoilers for Apollo Justice abound in this section.

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Klavier doesn't call him.

Perhaps Klavier had expected Sebastian to hear about it through office gossip. Since Sebastian does, it's not an untrue assumption, but Sebastian's biggest source of intra-office information is Klavier himself. That means it takes over an hour for Sebastian to overhear someone talking about what a shame it is Gavin's career and life is falling apart, and that's an hour during which he could have been doing something more useful than filling out forms in triplicate.

Once he knows, it takes Sebastian less than ten minutes to make his way to Klavier's office. The door is locked, and Klavier doesn't respond to Sebastian's knocks or attempts to open it. Sebastian almost leaves then, but after a moment's hesitation he instead pulls out the duplicate copy of Klavier's office key that Kay had slipped to him a little over a year ago. (She slipped Klavier one to Sebastian's office, and she clearly has copies of both, so Sebastian had seen little point in refusing.)

Opening the office door slowly, Sebastian pokes his head in, scanning for any sign of his friend.

Klavier is standing in front of his desk, both hands palms-down on the top, his head bowed. He doesn't move when Sebastian slides into the room, doesn't seem to have heard the klak of the key or the click of the door closing behind Sebastian.

"Klavier...?" Sebastian's voice is hesitant, shuddering with Sebastian's uncertainty.

Klavier's head jerks up, and when he turns to face Sebastian, there is a smile on his face. "Hallo, Herr Erste."

It isn't a true smile. It's a pretty enough smile, but it's the smile that Klavier wears on-stage when he's feeling under the weather, into the courtroom when he's not a hundred percent sure of his deductions. It's a smile that doesn't touch his eyes, that hides everything he is really feeling, and it has been a while since Sebastian was kept at arm's length with it.

To say the last six months have been difficult for Klavier would be a gross understatement. Sebastian was with him when it all started crumbling to pieces. Kristoph hadn't called Klavier; no one at the prison had thought to call Klavier, though Klavier is listed as next of kin and should be well-known to most of the staff after seven years of brilliant work. Instead Klavier heard about it on the evening news, in the break room at work, while he and Sebastian were just trying to get a coffee and take a small break in a stressful twelve-hour day.

There's been a mistake. Klavier had smiled, that same uneasy smile that didn't quite reach his eyes. We'll get it sorted out.

Sorting it out had proven far harder than Klavier's grin had made it seem. It wasn't until two months later that Klavier was able to find a reason to meet the young defense attorney who had unexpectedly managed to get Kristoph Gavin convicted of murder, and when he did, what he found didn't help put any pieces together.

He's a good man. Klavier had been lying with his feet up on the sofa, his head on the floor in Sebastian's lap. It had taken Kay and Sebastian both arguing with him to finally get Klavier to let them follow him home, when usually Klavier is the first to welcome people with open arms.

Given how much Klavier had been drinking and how little he had smiled that night, Sebastian wasn't surprised at his friend's reluctance for company. Klavier has had little experience dealing personally with trauma, and it's clear he doesn't understand how to handle it.

Justice. Klavier's eyes had closed as he said the name, expression puzzled, arms crossing over his chest, and Sebastian had buried his hand in Klavier's hair, trying to provide some form of comfort. He's a good man. Clever. Honest. It must have been Wright. It must've...

Klavier's voice had been hesitant, though, and after a shared look Sebastian and Kay had tried their best to get him onto other topics.

And now... well, now there is no doubt about Kristoph Gavin's true nature. The video that's been posted to all the news sites is shaky, an illegal hand-held recording, but the contents are clear enough. It had taken Sebastian until his second viewing to get past how eerie it is seeing someone who looks so very much like Klavier fly into a frothing, frenzied rage and listen to what Kristoph was saying, but between words and actions his guilt is clear.

As is the guilt he has doled out onto other's shoulders, and Sebastian takes a hesitant step toward Klavier.

Klavier shies away, skittish as a colt, though his smile doesn't falter as he shoves a hand up to resettle his hair. "Can I help you with something, Sebastian?"

"I just wanted..." Sebastian hesitates, not certain what to say. He wishes Kay were here. Kay never seems at a loss for words, no matter what they're facing or what's happening around them.

Kay isn't here, though, and Sebastian is. Sebastian has been on the other side of this problem far more times than he'd like to count. What is it that Klavier does, when he finds Sebastian distraught about something?

And Klavier is distraught, though he hides it far better and with far more determination than Sebastian does. As Sebastian's eyes adjust to the dim room, all illumination provided only by the light coming in through the window, he can see where Klavier has torn through his office like a small tornado. Mementos of the Gavinners have been piled in one corner of the room, a messy hodgepodge of posters and discs and music and knickknacks that are usually carefully cared for. Even more worrying is the clutter of papers scattering the floor to the left of Klavier's desk, as though at some point before Sebastian entered Klavier had swept his arm across the surface, flinging everything away.

"I want to help." Sebastian straightens, his eyes finding Klavier's, though Klavier tries to break eye contact as soon as it's achieved. "I heard about what happened. Tell me what I can do to help."

Klavier laughs, but it is a strange, jittering, awkward sound, far different from either his stage laugh or his genuine howls of mirth. "There's really nothing you can do to help. So if you could lock the door behind you again on your way out—"

"Do you really want me to go?" Sebastian speaks quietly, as he once more tries and fails to catch Klavier's gaze. "Tell me to go, tell me there's really absolutely nothing I can do to help you, and I'll leave. I can't force you to let me help you. But I don't think that's what you really want."

Klavier stands frozen, his expression flickering between the calm, controlled court smile and something that Sebastian recognizes. It is a mix of horror and hurt, terror and trauma, despair and desolation, a toxic combination of emotions that Sebastian has spent far too much time having to clean himself of over the years. "What I want, Sebastian, is something—somethings—that can never happen."

Again Sebastian takes a step closer to Klavier, and again Klavier shies away, the high note that can't quite be reached. Stilling his feet, Sebastian reaches out with one trembling hand. "Will you let me hug you, Klavier?"

Klavier goes very still, his head drooping as his eyes study something on the floor, a faint frown on his face. "Wieso?"

Because Sebastian is afraid, seeing his usually-controlled friend like this. Because Sebastian has been here, far too many times, and he knows that sometimes a kind hand can make all the difference. Because Klavier is a tactile person, far more than Sebastian is, and the fact that Klavier won't let himself be touched right now screams wrong on a thousand levels. "Because you're my friend, and it would make me feel better."

"Ah." Klavier nods, the motion too detached, missing all of its usual grace. "If... if you want to."

Sebastian moves slowly, not wanting to startle Klavier. He moves up on Klavier's left side, his arm rising slowly. He hesitates for a moment, not sure whether he should try to put his arms around Klavier's neck or around his waist, and then with a shake of his head Sebastian just puts both arms around Klavier's chest and pulls him into a loose embrace.

For a moment Klavier stands rigid and stiff, a faint tremor running up and down his body—something that Sebastian can't see, but that he can feel quite clearly. Then a strangled noise, low and hoarse, escapes Klavier's throat, and his head comes down, his face buried against Sebastian's shoulder as his hands latch onto Sebastian's jacket.

"Do..." Sebastian pauses, feeling Klavier's trembling increase. "Do you want to talk about it?"

"Nein." Klavier laughs again, that strained, pained sound.

"All right. Then... do you mind if I talk about it?"

Klavier is quiet for a moment, his breath sounding loud and ragged in the silence. When he answers, it's in a thready, tired whisper. "Nein."

"All right." Sebastian tightens his arms around Klavier, and he has to clear his throat before he can continue, his tongue suddenly feeling too big. "I'm sorry. I'm so, so sorry."

"It isn't your fault." Klavier's head moves in a small negation. "You've no need to be sorry."

"It's a declaration of symmetry—damn it, sympathy." Sebastian blinks suddenly tearing eyes. "Also empathy. I know it's not the same, my father and your brother, but... I'm sorry. I'm so sorry you're having to go through this."

"It's not the same." Klavier's trembling increases, becomes full-body shivers that Sebastian can see as well as feel, that chatter his teeth together as he talks. "You didn't know anything. You were just a child, and your father—"

"You were seventeen, Klavier." Pulling back, forcing Klavier's head up one hand, Sebastian forces eye contact. "You were the same age when Kristoph used you as I was when my father tried to use me. Seventeen. We were both children."

A hesitant, broken smile toys at the corners of Klavier's mouth, but his eyes are empty and distant. "I should have seen. I should have seen before now. I've had so many opportunities... I could have looked into it back then. And then Broil tried to tell me. And then your father—"

"My father was a sadistic, terrible man, and nothing that he said the day he died was worth listening to." It's not true, sadly. There are some things that Blaize DeBeste said over the course of his life that were true—some things that were good, even, that provided decent advice. Don't be afraid. Don't hide your emotions. Others had a glimmer of truth hidden in the midst of a world of wrong, like a needle of hope in a haystack of despair. Right now, though, that is not what Klavier needs to hear. Later, perhaps, when he is dealing with a different part of grief, Sebastian can talk to him about the things that were good about Kristoph. Right now, though, he needs more to remember the good about himself. "You and Kay are the best things that have ever happened to me, Klavier. Do you doubt Kay, because of what he said?"

Klavier shakes his head, and Sebastian realizes for the first time that Klavier's blond hair is slick and darkened by sweat even as he shivers. "Kay is wonderful."

"Then there's no reason to doubt yourself, either."

Again that terrible laugh, and Sebastian thinks he's going to hear it in his nightmares for the next few months. "He is my bruder. Always people have said we are so similar, so—so—"

"You look alike, but that's evidently all." Sebastian reaches up, smoothing some of Klavier's hair back into a semblance of its usual position. "He's nothing like you. You showed that very clearly during the trial. A very wise man once said that it takes courage and bravery to face down someone you respect, someone who has had power over you. You showed both very clearly today."

Klavier shakes his head, a near-frantic negation, and his trembling increases another notch. "I was not brave. I—I—"

"Breathe, Klavier." Sebastian breathes slowly in and out, pulling Klavier in to a tight embrace again. "It's all right. Breathe."

"I..." Klavier's voice is thick, lacking the clean, clear tones it usually has. "The things... he did... the things he... used me for..."

"It was terrible." Sebastian murmurs out his affirmation. "You've every reason to be furious, to be hurt, to want to see him hurt."

Klavier's teeth are chattering audibly now, his hands once more clinging to Sebastian's jacket.

And Sebastian understands, at least a little bit. Tears begin to trickle down from his eyes, but his voice is steady. "You've also every reason to grieve. To cry. To hurt, both for what's happened and for what's to come."

"He's going to die." Klavier's breath shudders, gasps that don't seem to give him enough oxygen. "He—what he did—it's the justice I've seen done—he deserves it—he used me—but he's going to die—Kristoph's going to die, just like Daryan—and—and—"

Anything approaching coherency disappears after that, Klavier's words degenerating into gasping, terrible sobs as he buries his head against Sebastian's shoulder and just cries.

Sebastian has never really seen Klavier cry before, he realizes. These aren't pretty sobs, or a controlled fall of tears. Klavier's face burns a blotchy red, and his fine blond hair goes every which way as a combination of his frantic hands and his head against Sebastian's shoulder muss it. There are probably a hundred news agencies that would pay ludicrous amounts of money for a picture of Klavier like this, distraught and damaged and human, and for a moment Sebastian hates them all, for making it this difficult for Klavier to reach a point where he can just cry.

There are more important things to worry about, though. There is a friend to comfort, and Sebastian finds that Kay and Klavier have done well in their hands-on tutoring over the years. He knows better than to speak more than simple words and reassurances while Klavier is in the worst of the sobbing, because Klavier won't be able to hear or properly understand anything more complex. He knows to keep hold of Klavier, gently but with assurance, and when Klavier's knees buckle he is able to guide them gently to the floor. He knows that sometimes music can speak far more cleanly and clearly than words, and he hums out some of the melody lines he has helped Klavier work on over the last few months, trying to make the music more than just another source of pain. (He would kill Daryan for that, if he didn't know Daryan is already going to hang, for making the music something tainted and painful now too, and sometimes Sebastian thinks there are more ghosts of his father in him than he would like to admit.)

He knows to let Klavier go, when uncontrolled sobbing gives way to gentler sniffles, and to provide a tissue so that Klavier can begin making himself presentable.

He knows his friend, and though it is not something Klavier has had to do for him, Sebastian keeping his hair short, Sebastian reaches out to undo Klavier's braid and tries to straighten out the man's hair, knowing Klavier will feel better when he is looking pretty and presentable again.

Klavier shuffles in an awkward circle, giving Sebastian better access to his hair, the tissue crumpled in one fist. "Verzeihung. I didn't mean..."

"Didn't mean what?" Sebastian doesn't manage the same pretty little braid-ponytail-twist thing that Klavier has taken to wearing for the last year, but his simple braid is elegant and even, just like Kay taught him, and it should suffice for the moment. "Didn't mean to trust me? Didn't mean to let some of that hurt out before you did something... something we'd all regret?"

Klavier leans forward, hugging his knees to his chest. "I didn't mean to burden you."

Settling down next to Klavier, his shoulder against Klavier's, Sebastian follows Klavier's gaze to where it's fixed on the sunset colors starting to play outside. "Has it been a burden, those times you've let me cry on you?"

"Nein." Klavier huffs out a breath, his gaze darting to Sebastian, an annoyed frown flitting across his face. "That isn't what I meant. I just... I should be able to handle this."

"So it's all right for me to need help, to need to reach out, to need to cry, but it's not all right for you to? Is that the premise we're going with?" Sebastian tries to keep his tone gentle while still pointing out the hypocrisy.

"I'm not supposed to cry." Klavier's lips twist, a grimace that isn't quite a smile. "I'm Klavier Gavin. I'm a star. Just because everything I've built was based on a lie—"

"It wasn't." Sebastian's hand reaches out, resting atop Klavier's. "I've worked with you for seven years now. I know that everything you do, you do because you think it's right. This is the Dark Age of the Law. We've both heard that how many times? How many people have offered us bribes to look the other way? How many people have offered to forge evidence for us? But we don't do it. We stick to the facts and the truth and justice, and we do what's right, even when it's hard."

Klavier is silent for a moment, frowning faintly as he studies the beautiful palette of colors that the sky is becoming, but he doesn't pull his hand away from Sebastian's. "I've been wrong so often these last few months... I was wrong about the Kitaki case. I was wrong about Tobaye. I was wrong about Daryan. I've apparently always been wrong about K-Kristoph."

"I seem to remember someone telling me, after I first lost a case, that if the person wasn't guilty, it's right that we lose. There's no justice in sending an innocent to prison." Sebastian pauses, remembering far too well the sting of frustration and disappointment and disgust in himself that he had felt. "Actually, several people said that to me, and I think I needed to hear it from all of them."

"There is no justice in an innocent suffering in prison, you're right." Klavier closes his eyes, and his breathing hitches, just slightly. "As there is no justice in an innocent man suffering for seven years for a crime he did not commit."

"You didn't know. It wasn't your fault." The words feel hollow, helpless, but Sebastian says them anyway. Sometimes repetition is the only way to get a concept to really stick, especially when it is one that feels alien or that runs counter to the guilt and shame that want to consume all in their path.

"I disbanded the Gavinners. Officially." Klavier's voice is strained, and his gaze flicks to the pile of music memorabilia on the ground. "Not that we've been doing much since Daryan, everyone wanted to keep their heads down anyway, but I... I should focus just on the prosecuting."

"The music isn't the reason this happened." Sebastian tightens his hold on Klavier. "If you need a break—if you want a break—then take one. But you're the one who let me see that I could be more than one thing. More than just a prosecutor. More than just my father's tool. That I could love the music and use it and be a more complete person while still being a good prosecutor. I won't let some psychopathic, status-obsessed, vindictive, evil bastard take it away from you without a fight."

Klavier blinks, and there is honest humor in his smile as he meets Sebastian's gaze. "That psychopathic, status-obsessed, vindictive, evil bastard is my brother."

"I believe we already established earlier in the conversation that my father is a sociopath." Sebastian tries on a small smile of his own, surprised to find that it fits. "The prosecution submits as evidence that familial ties do not necessitate moral ties exhibit A, himself."

Klavier laughs, and though the sound is still slightly strained, it's actually his laugh again, warm and honest. "I barely feel up to being a prosecutor right now, Sebastian. I don't think I can handle playing defense attorney, especially for a theorem that I don't really want to see proved."

"Then just be the judge. Let the evidence presented speak for itself." The sky has darkened further, and Sebastian clambers to his feet.

He is holding out a hand to help Klavier up when the door to Klavier's office opens, and a familiar face pokes through, bringing a wash of industrial lighting from the hallway with her. "There you two are. I figured you had to be here, if you weren't in Sebastian's office."

"Kay." Klavier scrambles to his feet, a smile that is more honest than the one he greeted Sebastian with but still not quite true sliding into place. "What brings you to—"

Kay doesn't wait for an invitation. Marching across the office, she throws her arms around Klavier and hugs him tight. "It's going to be all right. I promise. No matter what it takes, we'll make everything right, and you'll be just fine, too."

Klavier's right hands rises, hovers hesitantly in the air for a moment before burying itself in Kay's hair. Sebastian can see Klavier's body untense again, his shoulders relaxing as he settles into the embrace. When he speaks, his voice is rough and low, burred by a German accent and what might be a lingering threat of tears. "I think, with the two of you here... we just might be able to do all that, Fraulein Gauner."

"Definitely." Kay frees her left hand, reaching up to pat Klavier on the cheek. Then her hand reaches out, toward Sebastian, though her eyes stay locked on Klavier. "Come on, you. This is definitely a time for a group hug."

Sebastian hesitates for just a moment, not certain it's really the time or the place, with the office door still cracked open. Though he knows that Klavier cares deeply about both of them, and that truth is more important than status to Klavier, Klavier is also a very perception-focused person, and if someone were to look in and get the wrong impression—

Then Klavier's left hand also rises, a clear invitation, and Sebastian joins the small huddle, holding his two closest friends tight. Let people think what they want. Keeping Klavier—keeping all of them—sane through this mess is what matters most, and there is nothing but good to be found in the feel of Klavier's calloused fingertips against his neck, in the clutch of Kay's hand at the back of his jacket, in the smell of Kay's perfume and Klavier's cologne mingled and the sounds of their breathing pushing away the silence and the coming darkness.

When they break apart, Kay has somehow ended up in the middle, and she grabs Klavier's left hand and Sebastian's right as she steers them toward the door. "Do either of you have anything that absolutely has to get done tonight?"

Sebastian shakes his head, and Klavier mutters out a quiet negation in German.

"Good. Then we're going to get dinner—I know this quiet little Japanese place, no one will recognize you, Klavier, and if they do they'll be smart enough not to say anything. Then we're going back to your place." Kay hesitates, glancing back at them for the first time. "Unless you'd prefer we go to Sebastian's place?"

"His or mine, I've no preference." Klavier's smile is tired but warm, lighting his eyes with a gentle fire. "So long as the two of you will be there, I will be far happier than I've any right to be."

Kay smiles back, and Sebastian allows himself to be pulled along. They pause just for a moment for Klavier to lock his office—during which time Sebastian makes sure Kay remembered to re-lock his—and then they head off together, taking the stairs and back hallways to avoid as many people as possible.

The next few weeks won't be easy. The last thing the legal system needs right now is another scandal—though at least this scandal is the undoing of an older one? Will that help? Or will a corruption-weary people just doubt everyone involved that much harder? No matter how the public perception falls out, Sebastian knows from bitter experience that Klavier's emotions are likely to be a roller-coaster of positives and negatives, unexpected catapults upwards and careening free-fall drops down for the near future.

But they are together. They have each other. They have a core group of friends and colleagues that they can trust still—Edgeworth and Gumshoe and Justine and Shields and Lang and Von Karma, at the least. They have new allies, potentially, because all that Sebastian has heard from Klavier about Apollo Justice makes the man sound rather wonderful.

The next few weeks won't be easy, but they have been through hell before, more times than Sebastian would like to think about, and with the support that they have—with the support that they can give each other—Sebastian has no doubt they can make it through this time, too.