Churnabout: Big Sister WIP Preview

I'm still pretty shook by Mia's fate, so I decided to write a "good ending" version of the game's second case where Mia devours and digests her attacker instead. Unfortunately, as it turns out, eating people might just be against the law!

Contains F/M samesize vore and digestion, and also spoilers for the Ace Attorney case 1-2

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Redd White scanned the offices of Fey and Co, waiting for his eyes to adjust to the darkness, until finally the thing he was after came into view. It was a clock, shaped like the Thinker statue, which had already been the murder weapon in a trial not too long ago. That wasn't why Redd was interested in it, though. His only concern was with the incriminating evidence being stored inside, and the woman who had acquired it, Mia Fey. He snatched the statue off the desk, weighing it in his hand. It felt just heavy enough to bludgeon someone with. Perfect. With it now in his position, he turned to the silhouetted woman standing at the end of the office, who still seemed to be unaware of his presence. He approached carefully, on the tips of his toes. The ostentatious would-be murderer raised the statue above his head, read to strike. And then-GULP

    ----

    "That's odd, Mia's car doesn't seem to be parked out front," Phoenix Wright mused to himself as he entered the Law Offices of Fey and Co. Phoenix was the "and Co." in question, and had been mentored by Mia for the past few months. He had learned enough about her in that time to know that she wasn't the sort of person to show up late unannounced. The office still seemed fairly normal when he entered it. Nothing appeared to be out of place, and yet, there was still an uneasy atmosphere hanging in the air. 

    His gut feeling became more justified as he approached Mia's desk. There were a few papers strewn around, a few random bits of furniture knocked over or slightly out of place. He immediately looked over at the window, and spotted the alarm clock modeled after the statue of The Thinker laying there on the floor, the murder weapon from his previous case, covered in a thin layer of some slightly shimmering substance. Phoenix immediately began to assume the worst. Had there been a break-in? Was Mia okay?

    He grabbed the phone to call her, but was interrupted as a girl came running into the room, clad in an oddly anachronistic purple outfit. Despite the fact that Phoenix was sure he'd never seen her before, she seemed oddly familiar. 

    "Hey, you're Phoenix, right?"

    Phoenix nodded, hovering the phone cautiously over the receiver. 

    "I'm Maya Fey. I'm Mia's younger sister. She's told me all about you."

    "Well, speaking of Mia, do you know where she is?" Phoenix asked. "She doesn't seem to be in the office, and I'm getting worried."

    "That's what I came here to tell you about! Mia was arrested this morning!"

    Phoenix was so shocked that he dropped the phone, leaving it dangling from its chord. "Arrested? What is she being charged with?"

    "They wouldn't tell me!" Maya said. "I asked around at the police station but everyone refused to talk to me!" Maya's voice became hushed. "But I think...I think it might be murder."

    "What makes you say that?" Phoenix said, trying to reassure this girl by keeping his composure, although he was starting to feel pretty rattled himself. 

    "By the way everyone was acting. I overheard someone saying they couldn't believe Mia would do something like this."

    "Have you been able to talk to her at all?"

    "No, she won't answer my calls, and they won't let me see her at the detention center. I was hoping maybe she'd talk to you, though."

    Phoenix was having trouble processing all this. Mia, a murderer? Surely there had to be some mistake. He wasn't sure why Mia would respond to him if she wouldn't even talk to her own sister, but if there was a chance he could get some more information about this insane situation then he would take it. He dialed Mia, this time using his personal cell-phone. His phone rung once, then twice, then a third time. And then, Mia answered. 

    "Hello, Phoenix, is that you?" she said. Already, Phoenix could tell that something was amiss. Mia's voice was hard to hear over this odd persistent rumbling noise in the background. Was there another earthquake where she was or something?

    "Yeah, it's me," Phoenix said. "What's going on? Is it true that you were arrested?"

    "Is Maya there?" she said. Once again, there was something subtly off. Her voice was a bit...huskier than usual, for lack of a better word, and her breathing seemed oddly heavy. "Make sure she doesn't hear any of this. I don't want her involved."

    Phoenix nodded. 

    "Just tell me what happened. Are you okay?"

    "I'm *URP* fine," Mia said, letting a short but powerful burp slip out in the middle of her sentence. Okay, something was definitely off. Mia would never, ever belch in front of Phoenix. "But yes, I was arrested on murder charges...among other things."

    "That's impossible, someone must be framing you, or..."

    "Calm down, Phoenix, it's alright."

    "Do you at least have a lawyer? I can be there in a few minutes."

    "There's no need. I'll be representing myself. You're free to attend the trial if you want to know what's going on, but I should warn you, you might see and hear some things that are...shocking."

    "It's nothing I can't handle," Phoenix said. "If there's anything I can do, let me know."

    "Just make sure Maya isn't involved, alright? I don't want her to know any of this until I have a chance to *BOOURP* explain myself."

    Phoenix hung up the phone, the sound of Mia's belch still ringing in his ears.

    "Well, what did she say?" Maya asked breathlessly. 

    "She's fine," Phoenix said. "She is going to trial, though, but I have full confidence that she'll be declared innocent. She doesn't want you to come, though."

    "That's okay," Maya said. "Just...just don't let my sister go to jail, okay!"

    ----

    Phoenix's agile, lawyerly mind was always abuzz with information, but right now it felt especially active. Why was Mia being charged with murder? What had happened in the office earlier that day? Why was she so insistent that Maya be kept in the dark? Hopefully he'd get some answers at the trial. Only a few days earlier he had completed his first case there, and now he was about to watch the mentor who had guided him through it stand accused herself. 

    Phoenix took a seat in the stands, which felt unusual. He wasn't used to seeing the courtroom from this angle, instead of behind the defense's chair. He immediately looked over to that familiar desk, only to see that it was empty. That made sense, since the accused was acting as her own attorney. Indeed, Mia was at the defendant's stand, although she was unlike how Phoenix had ever seen her before. 

    Well, that wasn't entirely true. She was still brimming with quiet confidence as always, and dressed in her black skirt-suit with her lawyer's badge pinned to her lapel. Only, the suit in question was profoundly stretched and distended around the middle by the enormous bloated belly jutting out from Mia's midsection. Her tummy appeared fairly taut, but with a noticeable bit of softness as well, as it sagged underneath its own considerable heft. It was as though Mia had become full-term pregnant with triplets and gained gained about 25 pounds overnight, and maybe had a pretty big lunch on top of that too. The swollen organ churned audibly, filling the courtroom with the echoing sound of her gastric grumbles. Phoenix immediately recognized this as the sound he had heard on the phone earlier. This whole situation had gone from strange to downright bizarre. At this point, Phoenix no longer had any idea what the hell was going on, and simply listened intently as the judge began to speak in hopes that it would help elucidate things. 

    The judge cradled his bald head in his hand before he spoke, as though he was nursing a massive migraine. "I can't believe this...after I've known this for years. Ms. Mia Fey, you stand accused of murder in the second degree, and..." he took a look at the papers in front of him, as though making sure that he wasn't mistaken. "...cannibalism."

    Silence fell over the courtroom. Phoenix nearly fell out of his chair, his mouth open agape in shock and his pupils shrunken until they were nearly invisible. It took all of his lawyerly composure not to scream "WHAT!?" at the top of his lungs for the entire courtroom to hear. If he had been a part of the defense, he certainly would have.

    "How do you plead?" the judge said. 

    All eyes were on Mia. She opened her mouth to speak, but no words came out. Instead. 

 BHHOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOURP!!!

    Mia's belch seemed to shake the very walls of the courtroom, as the sound tore through the silence in the stands, leaving an even more powerful silence in its wake once it finally tapered off after several seconds.

    "...excuse me."

    Mia raised one hand to her mouth to clear her throat, and rested the other against her bloated belly, gently caressing the mass of gurgling flesh beneath her suit to sooth it.

    "I plead not guilty, by reason of self-defense," Mia finally said. Several audible gasps could be heard. 

    "I did indeed kill Redd White, by means of devouring him, as you can see" Mia said, thrusting her hips forward slightly so her bulging stomach could be seen by all, as though it wasn't already the most conspicuous thing in the courtroom. "But I only did so because he broke into my office and attempted to murder me."

    The judge blinked. "Surely you're not suggesting that it's possible to completely cannibalize someone in self-defense," he said. "They'd certainly already be rendered unable to harm you after the first few bites."

    Mia shook her head. "Perhaps that would be the case under normal circumstances, but there wasn't a single 'bite,' in my case. I swallowed Redd White whole."

    The judge's eyes grew even wider. 

    "Objection!" came a familiar voice from the other side of the court. Phoenix's eyes were drawn to the prosecutor's desk, where none other than Miles Edgeworth stood. Phoenix had been so utterly focused on Mia herself that he hadn't even bothered to glance at the prosecution. Mia's case was so strange that Phoenix didn't notice his old friend even when he was just a few yards away. 

    Edgeworth stood hunched over his desk, hair disheveled and eyes wide and frenzied as if he hadn't slept for weeks. Phoenix had never seen him like this before, but he supposed he was getting to see plenty of new sides to his old friends today.

    "This is absurd," Edgeworth practically snarled. "Surely you don't intend for us to believe that you swallowed a man whole like a snake eating a mouse?"

    "That's exactly what I'm saying," Mia retorted. "Check the court record. Not a single part of Redd's body was found. If I had simply eaten his flesh in a more traditional manner, it stands to reason that some bones, or even his entire skeleton would've been found. And, need I remind you, there was no blood found at the crime scene either. And, lastly, I was arrested only 30 minutes after the crime had occurred! It would be impossible to completely consume a man's flesh in that time, and that's not even taking stomach capacity into account! So, the only way this would have been possible if I possessed the exceptional ability to swallow a man whole!"

   Edgeworth held his head in his hands. "This is insane," he muttered to himself. "Nothing in law school could've prepared me for this."

    But still, Miles couldn't allow any case, even one as batshit as this one tarnish his record. So he went through the motions, and proceeded to press the defendant as though this were an ordinary trial.

    "You say the police arrived thirty minutes after Redd's death, but there is no evidence in the record that establishes when he died. As you stated, no body was found."

    "ObUUUUUUURPjection!" Mia said, pointing her finger as she belched dramatically. "There may not be a body, but there was still evidence found at the scene that establishes the victim's time of death!" Mia produced a photo of the Thinker clock left by the window. "This may appear to be a statue, but it's actually an alarm clock. If you'll turn your attention to the display, it says that it's 3:00am. But if you look at the light in the photograph, it was clearly taken after sunrise! So something must've happened to the clock that made it stop functioning at 3:00am."

    "What does a broken clock have to do with anything?" Edgeworth said, trying very, very hard to compartmentalize the insanity of the situation. 

    "The court record also states that forensics found three pieces of evidence on this clock-DNA from my saliva, traces of human stomach acid, and Redd White's fingerprints! These three pieces of evidence can be used to reconstruct what happened that night-Redd White was holding the clock, intending to use it as a murder weapon. When I ate him, it entered my stomach with him, and shortly after my stomach acids destroyed the clock's internal mechanisms, rendering it unable to tell the time, and leaving it stuck at 3:00am, a few minutes after the attempted murder occurred. The police report says that they arrived at my office at around 3:30am, meaning that there was indeed only a half hour between Redd White's death and my arrest."

    It was a contest between Mia's churning stomach and Edgeworth's heavy breathing to see which could fill the court with more white noise. "And if the clock was in your stomach, how exactly did it end up on the floor of your office?" Edgeworth said, audibly at the end of his rope. 

    "I burped it up, of course. I wouldn't have been able to digest it. And that should serve as further proof that I swallowed him whole, as there would be no reason for the clock to be in my stomach if I had eaten him in any other way."

    Phoenix couldn't help but feel a strange sense of admiration towards his mentor. Somehow, she could still put together an incredible defense, even while she apparently had an entire human man melting away inside her stomach.

    "Hmm, yes. I can't see any holes in that story. We'll have Redd's time of death added to the court record!"

    "Wait!" Edgeworth said, unable to take in enough air to let out a full 'objection!'

    "Aren't you forgetting one very, very important fact?"

    "And what's that?" the judge said quizzically. 

    "That swallowing another human is impossible? Am I the only one here who isn't crazy?!?"

    "Hmm, yes, I suppose that question does loom fairly large over this case. Mia, do you have an explanation?"

    "As a matter of fact, I do!" Mia said, pointing with such force that her gut heaved, causing its semi-solid contents to audibly slosh. "The Fey family to which I belong are spirit mediums-able to channel the spirits of the dead. My clan has particular way of contacting spirits called the Kurain Channeling Technique. It allows us to channel the spirit into our body, taking on not only their voice but their physical form as well. When I saw Redd White sneaking up on me, I panicked, and channeled a forbidden spirit-that of a demon named Pandora de Voir. She was known as a devourer of men, and would swallow humans whole to feed her hellish appetite. When I channeled her, I took on her physical form, and gained the ability to swallow someone in a single gulp just as she could."

    "Of course, now she's saying that she was possessed by a demon," Edgeworth said. Was she trying to be declared not guilty by reason of insanity? Perhaps the smartest strategy would've been to allow Mia to continue to explain how she'd eaten Redd White, as she was essentially making his case for him, and yet, he couldn't let this nonsense stand. "Do you really expect any of us to believe that?"

    Mia shook her head, crossing her arms over her generous bosom and resting them atop her bulging tummy. "No, I don't. That's why I'm offering to give a demonstration. I can channel Pandora de Voir for you right now. My meal isn't fully digested yet, so her appetite should be sated. If she's still hungry, I should be able to banish her spirit before she eats anyone else."