Chapter Text
Apollo Justice was a bit of a lightweight.
After tonight's bar visit of four glasses of white wine, and a couple of those really nice Pina Coladas that Simon was getting for himself and offered to buy him one, that turned to two or three.
At this point in the night he's definitely past the point of tipsy, managing to skip being euphoric drunk, and jumped straight to the point of being a chatty, clingy drunk. It doesn't help that there was a fucking CUTE prosecutor who kept drinking with him, and buying him drinks.
Typically, he avoids going out to bars, and drinking at all but for once, he felt he fucking deserved to. After all, the last time he went to a bar at all was right after that last trial, for Clay's murder. A lawyer can't cry until it's all over. That's what he forced himself to believe until the end of that. It didn't help at all. He cried for nearly all of that, and then broke down by himself in a gastro pub, getting drunk on the cheap house wine and a terrible basket of fries, trying to numb himself to cope that he lost the only person left, who was truly important to him.
It also helped him to drunkenly hook up with a couple of random men that night. Sleeping by himself in his own bed was not an option, no matter what. He wouldn't have been able to face trying to rest in a place full of memories, where he used to cuddle and hold his best friend platonically, whenever either of them needed company. That couple of months of experimental dating and sex, whilst Apollo was still in law school, that ended up just fading back into the old friendship, mainly due to lack of time for it, for either of them, given Clay's space training, and Apollo having to intern at one of the most prestigious law offices, at the time anyway.
The only reason he even decided to go out and drink tonight anyway, was because of a random invite from Simon Blackquill. He didn't honestly think they were close enough to ever hang out, let alone go get a drink together, but after the trial they both had today. Well, Simon seemed to soften up a little bit, being brave enough to ask him to go somewhere. It also helped that it was to the same location that he went to, last time. Close enough to get to, without needing a vehicle at least.
Apollo doesn't like to get too drunk most of the time anyway, because whenever Apollo and alcohol gets mixed together, he ends up being an incredibly horny mess in such a desperate and quite embarrassing way, for him at least; as well as him being left quite emotionally open. Usually he'll start talking about most, if not all of his demons in a way that he could never actually manage to do sober, even when legitimately wanting to, in the offices of any therapist or psychologist in the country of Japanifornia, including Athena.
...
Simon Blackquill was currently sitting next to Apollo at the bar, nursing his Pina Colada, trying to subtly stare at and pick apart the brain as well as admire the body of the fellow lawyer beside him.
"I don't know wh--*hic*--why I'm still there, honestly. I get less respect than the plant, unless I'm... *hic* on my knees, cleaning."
Simon barely managed to stop himself from making quite a provocative joke about how Justice must look on his knees. The mental imagery, though, was quite appealing for the man. Perhaps without the toilet brush would make the sight a hell of a lot sexier, but in his opinion, a man doing the chores is quite an attractive trait.
"Like seriously. Why do they, *hic*, do they just want me because I'm cheap? I'm not that good a lawyer. *hic*"
"Balderdash, Justice-dono. You're quite an esteemed lawyer. Especially compared to some of the other buffoons and morons I've been forced to bloody deal with. You're, at least, a challenge. You definitely have an eye for interesting cases, or dare I say a bracelet for interesting cases?"
"Nrgh?"
"Oh, come off it, Justice-dono, it's not a secret. After all, how else did you get through other cases before me? I know every lawyer within your agency has a... bloody hell, I'm blanking on a good term... let's just say "quirk", with how they handle their cases. "
"...yeah, yeah true. I just... *hic*, you know, never thought about it. It's the only part I have of my birth family, and I still don't *hic* fucking get any of how it works. If I don't use the trick, it gives me insanely bad migraines."
He paused, just to let the words start to sink in, as he sipped more of his drink.
"Besides... I don't know why I'm still at that office. *hic* I mean, Athena and Trucy are really cool, but I'm still just kinda unhappy there? Maybe I don't fit in there, or am I just looking for an *hic* normal office, that I can have less... less serious cases?"
"Well, Justice... I've felt like that. The prosecutor's office, was quite cliquey. I had a couple of "pals" and mates, and I only really mean pal for Chief Detective Gumshoe."
"Really?"
"Yes, now let me finish my damn train of thought, please."
Apollo actually shuts up for a moment, after Simon interrupted his question like that.
"I'm sorry, that was quite a bit harsher than I meant, but thank you. Where was I? Oh, yes. I nearly left the prosecutor's office several times, back then. I mean, worst case, I move back across the pond. I'm legally licensed there as a barrister, for a worst-case situation anyway, but for a while there, it was a bloody nightmare in that office. It only stopped being so cliquey when Winston Payne retired. His younger brother is still quite a massive twat, but one is a LOT better than two, innit?"
He pauses his running train of thought for a moment, so he can grab his half-finished drink, just to scull what was left in it.
"It also helps that everybody else, even Edgeworth, can't stand that bloke, at all. I heard that he was trying to "encourage" him to retire, like his brother. No luck, but hey, props for trying. Don't even think he's in any of the prosecutor chats."
...
"Simon... why are you so fucking sexy like *hic* holy mother, how in the hell? God, I'd never win a case again, just to have a *chance to worsh--*body like yours."
Blackquill was slightly surprised to hear what the man had to say about him, but was even more surprised to hear something almost slip out of Justice-dono's mouth, but decided not to acknowledge or try to figure out what he nearly said, and went back to his drink, taking a big sip before continuing his original thought.
"Thank you, Justice-dono, but I don't quite understand the appeal of my body," said Prosecutor Simon Blackquill, sighing. "If I had someone to share these wretched nights with, I wouldn't be feeding my sorrows in a bloody gastro-pub now, would I?" The question, no matter how rhetorical it truly was, just hung there, within the awkward silence after it.
It doesn't help Simon that he was sitting next to the short, loud man in red, who looks like he was still wearing his courtroom suit and tie, minus the vest, was sitting next to him, visibly drunk with his spiky parts of his hair, that everybody tends to call "his horns", which was starting to noticeably droop down over his face, somehow making him look even more incredibly attractive.
Just staring at him erects some naughty thoughts within him, and causes him to noticeably shuffle himself on the barstool. Apollo doesn't seem to notice, with his eye closed for a second, trying to take in what he just said, responding quicker than he expected to what he just said.
"Whaaaattt?" Apollo exclaimed, trying his hardest to not slur his words, while being quite shocked. "Your style is incredible, like sexy Tumblr goth but in a realistic way!"
"How the hell does Simon not know he's the fucking hottest prosecutor out of the whole office?" ponders Apollo, a little bit lost in thought of daydreaming about what Simon looks like topless, this second.
The answer is, he'd look very, very fucking hot.
"Mind your language." Simon mutters before the rest of what Justice said started to process. As soon as he understood what was said, Simon Blackquill stopped his slouching and sat up completely straight hearing that.
Did Apollo Justice just say that? He thinks I'm the hottest out of the office? Surely he's thinking of Klavier Gavin. or Franziska Von Karma, or Miles Edgeworth? Surely, the man wasn't referring to him.
"...what do you mean by that, Justice?"
Fuck. Apollo just realised that he had said that, out loud.
Double fuck. He didn't call him Justice-dono.
TRIPLE FUCK! Apollo might have gotten hard from his fucking daydreaming.
He didn't know how to break the silence of his own doing. His current train of thought was fixated on ogling at, and drooling over Blackquill's "casual" clothes right now. The way it was hugging his body in ways he'd never seen on him before, It was driving him wild in the middle of the semi-crowded bar. Knowing Simon though, this style was probably done by accident, that or Athena became his stylist for some reason.
Either way, it was breaking Apollo's brain, and it was not helping that his filter was definitely turned off for the night because of how much he had to drink.
"I mean that-- *hic*, that you're so handsome and that I real-- *hic* god I really want you, Simon," Apollo drunkenly crooned at the taller man, as he turned in the stool, to look at him in the face.
"Do my eyebags and dishevelled appearance turn you on that much, Apollo?" Simon could barely apply his usual calm and collected tone as he spoke, asking much more of a genuine bewildered question, rather than the self-deprecating joke that he was trying to verbally paint it as.
He tried to hide his face in his hands, arms against the bartop, hiding the deep blush that was growing more visible on his face, until Apollo actually put his hand on his shoulder. He looked up and towards him, seeing his face in more detail than he ever imagined when looking at one of his courtroom rivals.
Simon started to soften a little as he looked into Apollo's eyes. His beautiful, blank eyes, that could stare through your soul at a moment's notice. It's not the usual look he's giving when he's trying to tell if you're lying to him. It's a look of... something Simon can't really identify, unfortunately.
"So-- *hic* So what if it does? What then?" he muttered as he was losing confidence in the words he was saying while admiring Simon's face, smirking a drunken yet adorably goofy looking grin.
"Then, I'd be forced to admit I've been finding you quite attractive myself... It doesn't help that I've been slightly fixated on the thought of you being on your knees at the agency since you mentioned that, no matter how boring and unsexy what you were actually doing was. It also doesn't help that red is your colour... and you've been wearing that bloody colour on your face for the last twenty minutes now."
Apollo, now completely embarrassed and just a bit turned on, leans over to the British twat trying to pound down his Pina Colada, eager to try and get his attention. Their faces, hot from the heat of the alcohol as well as the tension that felt as thick as a folded newspaper, were inches away from each other.
Simon smirked at him, and quipped, "Is that a sword in your pants or did you wish to duel at dusk?".