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[wunderkind]

STUFF GOES IN HERE

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[jurisimpudent]

[He's quiet for a moment, staring at Sirius. If he'd asked a question like this yesterday, he'd have earned a nasty word at best, possibly a punch in the jaw. If anyone else asked this - any of the other students - they'd get a snarled none of your business. A professor would get an answer, but it would be clipped, factual, and impartial.

Sirius...He gets a long, panicked stare, and then a gaze dropped to his hands, and a shaky answer.

Stupid. Completely stupid. He shouldn't be emotional. Stupid.]

There's a...an orphanage. That I have to go back to. In summers.

[A miserable pause.]

As a minor, I am not deemed fit to tend to my own welfare.

[Another pause.]

Why.

[doggedly]

[This is a little cruel, and he knows, as he's asking--as he's watching the play of emotion on Edgeworth's face--he knows that it's cruel. He knows better than anyone else, probably, because he's seen things, he's read thoughts no one else has.

But there is a capacity for cruelty that lives in him, right beside that capacity for goodness that Edgeworth picked up on. It comes easily to him; it resists the feelings of guilt and heartlessness--and it makes it easy, then, to smile mirthlessly.]

Would you get your own place, if they'd let you?

[jurisimpudent]

[Would he get his own place? What a joke of a question. What would Sirius expect the answer to be? That Miles would prefer to continue on at the orphanage, where he must jealously guard his books of magic and his wand - where he has nothing to speak of and no one to speak of it with? Or that he'd move into some foster home with children who know nothing of magic? That he likes being told when to go to bed, when to get up, what to eat, when to eat it...Absurd. Completely absurd.

Miles hasn't had a home since he was eleven years old. That house had a mortgage on it that Miles' inheritance didn't even begin to pay off - though the thought of explaining a mortgage to Sirius Black, of the endless coffers and ancestral castles, is a joke in of itself. So in the end, Dad's legacy was a few artefacts and ten thousand pounds spread amongst a few investments, the contact numbers for a few relatives who were in no position to take in a teenaged boy. That's all. To have a home now, to have something that's his, that's the land of the Edgeworths - some family territory -

A joke of a question.

Edgeworth's answer, though, is stubbornly neutral and impersonal, even though the emotion he feels is written clearly on his face.]

The desire for property is nearly universal amongst adults of the Western world. Again. Why.

[doggedly]

That's not an answer.

[He stares at Edgeworth, level, firm, even if his hands are clenched so tightly into fists that they nearly hurt, even if his jaw is set so hard it aches, a little, in its way--he stares at Edgeworth, and doesn't look away, and he doesn't know precisely the pattern of his thoughts but he can guess at it, he can see that he is thinking that there is something working there and he can guess, too, at what his answer is--hardly a guess, he knows so much of Edgeworth--]

Would you. If you had the chance, if you had the money for it. If they'd let you. And what d'you do on actual holidays, still, Christmas, and Easter--d'you just go home by yourself, then, with all the lights shut off, same dinner as always, alone?

I want to know because I want to know what's going to happen to me. No one's going to kill my parents. But they'll as good as kill me, in their heads.

[jurisimpudent]

Am I to show sympathy?

[That's a stupid response; Edgeworth knows it. Obviously Black isn't saying that for pity: it's an explanation for his priorities, a reason why he can't. If anyone is sad, looking for sympathy, pathetic, in this conversation, it's not Black.

Just - lights shut off, dinner alone - God, that...hurts.]

Parents won't just disown their child. No matter how displeased they might be with their decisions, your parents won't just cut you off. Families don't work like that.

[doggedly]

[He smiles, tersely.]

You clearly don't know my family. They do it all the time. That's what's done, you're knocked off the family tree and disowned and they never fucking speak to you again. It's the oldest tradition in the noble and ancient House of Black. So don't tell me what my parents would do. I know what they would do.

[It's short, bitter--but it's not seeking sympathy. The last thing he wants from Edgeworth, of all people, is sympathy. It just needs to be said--couldn't say why that is, if he were asked. Maybe just so someone hears it, because they minute they part company here, he's not going to mention it again. Even if he does go to their side, he's not going to talk about his family. They will slice him out of their life and he'll do the same.]

[jurisimpudent]

[And Edgeworth saw that, didn't he? He saw that name scorched off the tree, smelled that acrid smoke in the air. And yet it just...It wars with everything he knows and believes. A father and mother don't just forsake their child.

Maybe it's the orphan's nostalgia clouding his memory and his mind. Perhaps that's it. But if there was one constant in his life - is one constant in his life - it's his memory of his dad's love.]

Even if that were true - which I'm not convinced of - why would they do so? Going against Voldemort isn't going against them. You convince them that he's bad for him and everything will be fine.

[doggedly]

You don't get it.

[He snaps that, his anger flooding into him again, washing away any little sympathies that he might have for Edgeworth. Idiot sympathies. There's no place for them. Typical fucking pig-headed Miles Edgeworth right here.]

I can't convince you because you're not going to get it. Going against Voldemort is going against everything they've founded themselves on. It's money, and power, and privilege--and tradition. They do things the way they've always been done.

There's no convincing them he's bad, because if he's bad, if he loses--they lose it all. All of their precious power and superiority--that's what we have. We have a bank vault of gold and we have the knowledge that we're better than everyone else, and they're not going to listen to anyone that tells them otherwise. They'd kick me out faster than you could blink. They've done it before.

[jurisimpudent]

Done it before to other people. Not to their own son.

[That's a sticking point - that will always be a sticking point. It's impossible for him to envision parents who'd do that to their kids.]

And there's no reason for them to lose it all if he loses. Your family existed for however many years prior to Voldemort - I'm sure you can tell me precisely how many. There's no reason for them to cease existing when he's gone.

[doggedly]

No. Just to nieces, and brothers--Merlin, you think it's such a leap to me? They don't care. Blood traitors are blood traitors.

And you're right, they'll exist. But they'll be bloody miserable. They've have lost their standing and their credibility--their power, Edgeworth. Or d'you really think this all started with Voldemort?

[He laughs again, dark, sharp.]

No. It's been going on before him--long before him. He just puts a face on it. He's just someone to gather behind, to agree with, but they've all thought this same shit for years.

[jurisimpudent]

[Edgeworth shakes his head, starting to argue against it - pointing out how illogical it is, how improbable. Yet the argument gets twisted around in his mouth and turns instead into, rawly, a single question:]

Why?

[doggedly]

[There's a great many answers he could give to that question, some biting, some cruel, some sarcastic--and he even starts in with one, or he thinks to--

But instead, he looks at Edgeworth, and then looks away again, pushing his hand over his mouth, his shoulders tense.]

Because that's the way it's always been.

[jurisimpudent]

[Edgeworth lets out a single, miserable scoff. The way it's always been. His own response to that is, in fact, deeply sarcastic - ]

Brilliant reasoning. Impossible to argue with. And, while we're at it, we've always treated medical conditions by bleeding the patient - why not continue on with that, as well?

[He shakes his head, bitter.]

If you all would just leave us alone, we'd be...We've not done anything to any of you.

[doggedly]

They have reasons. Pages, and pages of reasons. They've got old grievances and hurts and-- stories, that they've made up to justify it to themselves. They're better, that's what their reason is, and you're--

[They, they, he keeps saying they when it should be we. But separated from them, it's-- so much more difficult, to be full of conviction.

Abruptly, he laughs.]

My great-aunt told me that muggle-borns steal magic from wizards. That's how they get it. They take wands off of wizards, but they start by stealing magic--that's where squibs come from. And d'you know what, she actually believed it.

[jurisimpudent]

[Edgeworth, true to form, reacts initially to the wrong thing entirely:]

I've never stolen anything in my life.

[But a moment after, he shakes his head, because he knows that's not the point; it's just his instinctive reaction to being accused of a crime, however indirectly.]

That's foolish. I - When I was six, I set a paper on fire accidentally when I got a B. That wasn't even the first - I never asked for it, and I never understood it. I -

[But that's still wrong. Those sorts of appeals aren't going to even come close to convincing Sirius. So instead, there's just this, sad and frustrated:]

When we first started talking on that train, I really wanted to be your friend.

[doggedly]

[He snorts, at that first protest--and he's hardly listening to the rest of it, it's just empty, to him--he doesn't believe that shit, he could tell that to Edgeworth, he doesn't believe it but there's people who do--

Talking about the Hogwarts Express is nearly as low a blow as dredging up Sirius' own memories to parade about in front of him. Sirius stares hard at Edgeworth, his ears ringing. He's actually thought about that moment a great deal--not that moment, exactly, but that first day--the weird hope that he held tightly in his chest, a hope he couldn't put a name to or even understand--and then it had crumpled underneath him, all of it, twisting down into the role he was always meant to fill.]

It wasn't ever going to happen. Not-- friends.

[jurisimpudent]

I'm aware. I was simply a naive fool back then.

[But that's not said without sentiment. A naive fool, full of his father's words and admonitions - that when he went off, he had to learn everything he could but always keep an open mind. That he should be kind and seek out those who were kind. He regrets his humiliation, but he doesn't fully regret his wide-eyed earnestness - not when it was what his father wanted.]

But you weren't as bad as the rest of them, you know. Not that first day, at least; you turned into a right bastard after. [A slight pause, and quieter:] And you were...funny. And smart. Before Greengrass came into the compartment, and Goyle - you were almost even kind.

[doggedly]

I wasn't.

[He corrects him, quietly, grimly. He stares down at his hands, instead of looking at Edgeworth. It feels as if there's something hard in his chest, it makes it hard to swallow to take a breath--]

I was always a bastard. That's what I'm meant to be. [The irony of him saying that, with his blood purer than anyone's--isn't lost on Sirius, and he laughs, and pushes his hand over his mouth. Merlin.]

Everybody has a role that they're meant to play. It wasn't ever going to be anything different for me. And it's stupid, I thought--

[No. Now he's just fucking rambling; he shuts his mouth, hard, trapping that thought away.]

[jurisimpudent]

[He'd been lost enough in his own pensive sorrow, but he looks up now - sharp, flinty. He'd have seized onto that even without knowing what he knew; now, understanding Sirius Black so much better, he has some inkling of where that sentence is going to go and he's not going to just let it go.]

You thought what?

[doggedly]

[Sirius scowls, instantly. He hates that he said that, that he let even that little bit of extra thought slip out. Bad enough that Edgeworth knows as much as he does--now he's just giving the information away as well. Well done, Black.]

It doesn't matter. It didn't happen. All of that shit, that was years ago. Why even talk about it?

[And then, more cuttingly, to try to get away from the topic at hand:] You don't actually still think about first year, do you? My God, Edgeworth. You have to let things go.

[jurisimpudent]

[And that makes Edgeworth flinch, look away - he turns his gaze downwards, towards the ground. Because there is something inherently humiliating, yes, about being the sort of person who dwells on someone not liking them. And there's something humiliating in living in the past. And there's something deeply painful in knowing that...he'll never not think about first year. Those months will be seared painfully into his memory. He'll never rid himself of them.

But Black is trying to get a rise out of him. He's trying to get him to back off. So:]

If it's irrelevant, Sirius, why do you look like you're about to be sick?

[And that's good. Sounds scathing.]

[doggedly]

I don't.

[He bites out the words, short. Which is stupid, really, as it only makes the truth of Edgeworth's words more obvious and true.]

Why do you look as if you might cry? What d'you want me to say, that I wish we'd been friends? I don't. I don't care. And I don't sit around thinking about first year, or the Sorting, or any of it, because-- what happened, happened.

[jurisimpudent]

[And Edgeworth grits his teeth and stares down at the grass. He's willing to fight on a lot of things, factual and emotional, and not back down, but...Miles Edgeworth is lonely, and he is friendless, and one cannot be friendless and stand forth and arrogantly proclaim that of course Sirius wished they had been friends. (Because even if they'd been sorted together, into the same house, there's still such a world of difference between them. Miles can't even find a place amongst the other prefects, or amongst the other Gryffindors; why would cool Sirius Black, star Quiddich player, effortlessly handsome, pay the least heed to clumsy, stodgy, ill-spoken Miles Edgeworth?)

It's not without a hint of cruelty, though, that Edgeworth says:]

A pity. You'd have made a better Gryffindor than you do Slytherin.

[And then he's shaking his head, gathering himself up, brushing off his robes in preparation for standing to go. Look as if he might cry - No. There's no time to be that stupid, soft-hearted little boy anymore. He's not going to cry; he's going to act.]

But fine. If you refuse to help, then you refuse to help; I'm not going to use the Imperius curse on you. I just request that you not get in my way.

[doggedly]

[First year Sirius Black--stupid kid, a wide-eyed idiot with no sense of anything--had thought the world infinite, and if someone had said to him you'd make a better Gryffindor than Slytherin, he'd have put them off, quickly, because that wasn't allowed. Blacks were Slytherins, he'd have cited that fact--but somewhere, deep in him--he would have been pleased.

And Sirius hasn't forgotten that feeling. He's buried it, he's pushed it away, he's twisted it with hatred of Gryffindors, joined all the old prejudices--

So why the fuck does he still feel it, that stupid swoop, in his chest, why does he look up at Edgeworth as he stands, expression uncouched for the moment--before he narrows his eyes, before he glares up at him.]

You don't know that.

[Shut up about it, he orders himself, shut up about it, it doesn't matter, and he believes that--]

What are you going to do, exactly.

[jurisimpudent]

[And Edgeworth catches just the last moment of that expression - and something twists within him - and it is pity, isn't it? He does pity Sirius Black. He pities the boy's sorrow, his loneliness...But no; Edgeworth is lonely; Edgeworth is sorrowful. Rather, it's this: he pities him for not having the strength to break away from the expectations on him.]

I'm going to Dumbledore first. And then I'm going to go to the party.

[Once he would have said this with vicious irony; now there's just quiet resignation.]

Don't worry; I'll play the thieving Mudblood. If they catch me, I'll just say I stole the letter from amongst your things. The loss of face will be minimal.