Lana goes on, “Damon Gant…he was everything I aspired to be.” So Lana also wants to use water therapy and discreet handjobs to pray the gay out of all the prosecutors and police? Once Ema has further soaked her panties about the most effective detective duo ever–just saying, but I bet Gumshoe would look a lot cooler too if he had a second person helping him with all his cases–Phoenix asks what broke up the partnership. Lana reveals that she always wanted to be a prosecutor, since duh, she did go to law school. Ema finishes for her that the only reason she became a detective was to get investigation experience that would be helpful in court. I doubt that Manfred von Karma was out on the mean streets solving crimes in his lacy three-piece suit, and he was undefeated in court, so it seems like this was less than necessary. But maybe Lana was trying to break the glass ceiling in the prosecutors’ office and needed all the résumé padding she could get. “Gant’s help in the SL-9 case was critical in its resolution,” Lana severely understates. “After that, he became Chief of Police, and arranged my transfer to the Prosecutor’s Office.” Where she became Chief Prosecutor with zero experience in court. Subtle, Chief Gant! I bet von Karma had such a screaming, wall-humping hissy fit after he read that press release. Edgeworth probably couldn’t sit down for a month.
Phoenix finally asks about the Joe Darke investigation, and Lana explains that she was Gant’s second-in-command for the case. So there were five fucking detectives working SL-9, including the Chief/Head/Vice-Head of Detectives himself. I know it was a serial murder case, but Gumshoe can barely even requisition a memo pad now. It seems like criminal affairs was riding high on the hog two years ago. Lana also mentions that the two of them shared an office at the time, so it’s highly unlikely Lana was unaware of Gant’s side business as a gay conversion therapist. I wonder if Gant placed her in the prosecutors’ office just to lure Edgeworth into his cold tub. Anyway, Lana goes on, “We led a team of the best detectives on the force: Detective [Niceguy], whose case it was, Jake Marshall and Angel Starr.” Except Marshall and Starr both made a point of saying that Niceguy was not in their league. How did he even end up with this case? Was everyone else sick that day?
*loud slurping sounds*
As for Darke, Lana insists that he was definitely guilty, as the Wrists-Slitting Theme dies away to give extra weight to her words. “We asked him to come in for questioning,” she says. “We were desperate for evidence.” So they were sure he did it, but a) they had no evidence of this and b) he was willing to come in for questioning? Sure, okay. The Tragic Piano of Two Years Ago butts in as Lana states, anger all over her face, “That was when the last murder took place.” As we’ll see shortly, the real murder victim that night was plausible plot-writing. Once Ema has restated what happened, Lana adds that she was the first person on the scene, which should have been obvious given that Ema woke up in Lana’s arms, it was Lana’s fucking office, and Lana too was a witness. “Now you tell us,” Phoenix blue-fonts, making me heave a deep sigh.
“Detective Gant and Prosecutor Marshall were the ones questioning Darke that day,” Lana goes on. “The investigation was in its final stages, when Darke must have panicked.” It was in its final stages, but they were desperate for evidence! This still makes all the sense in the world! “He waited until Gant and Marshall let their guards down, then fled the room.” What? Seriously? He just ran out the fucking door? Wasn’t he handcuffed? Wasn’t the door locked? Wasn’t there a guard outside? Didn’t one of them have a gun? Isn’t Gant built like a fucking bull and should have had no problem shoving Darke to the floor? If Gumshoe had been there, his pay would have been cut so badly he’d be paying to go to work.
‘Also, there was jizz everywhere. Just… everywhere.’
So let’s accept, I GUESS, that this could have even happened, and that Harry fucking Houdini flew the coop. “From there,” Lana says, “he ran straight to…the office shared by Detective Gant and myself.” Wow, good thinking, buddy! Darke was apparently smart enough to get out of that room somehow, but dumb enough to not get the fuck out of the building. ANYWAY. Lana was filing some paperwork–possibly a maintenance request to fix all the broken security measures in the interrogation room–and returned to her office. “I saw three bodies on the floor and smelled blood,” she says over a flashback image of Neil Marshall, with a knife in his back, stacked on top of Joe Darke like a pancake. Both men are fully clothed, a strong indicator that someone tampered with this crime scene. Phoenix Shions, “Three bodies?”–Jesus, man, take some notes or something–and Lana explains, “Prosecutor Marshall, the victim, Ema, who had passed out, and the suspect, Joe Darke. During the struggle, it seems Mr. Marshall stuck [sic] a final blow before he died.” Yeah he did. Nice. “Joe Darke had incurred a minor concussion,” Lana says, “and lay unconscious.” Kinky! Lana did her sisterly duty first and carried Ema out of the room before doing her police duty and slapping some cuffs on Darke, while the ghost of Neil Marshall protested, “I called dibs!”
The music fades again as Phoenix tries to get his spiky head around all this. Well. He actually says, “Let me get this straight. You were all involved in the SL-9 Incident?” JESUS JUMP-ROPING CHRIST, NICK. NO. THEY ALL MADE UP THIS STORY TO FUCK WITH YOU.
Sorry. Lana concurs and tells him, “Quite a coincidence, hmm?” And don’t you fucking start, lady, you’re on thin ice with me, too. But even though Phoenix listened to all of that and could barely even register who all the principals were–like a Game of Thrones viewer who hasn’t read the books and can’t remember any of the names–he immediately calls bullshit on Lana’s claim of coincidence. When Ema protests that SL-9 was two years ago and therefore of no interest to anyone, Phoenix is all, “Oh, you know, except for all the people who were apparently scarred for life by it, including you. But no, totally, Ema.” That was me. Lana focuses on the actions of Jake Marshall, like he’s somehow the lone oddball who cared about this. “Ever since his brother died, he’s changed completely,” Lana says, and Ema adds, “I guess he wasn’t convinced with the ruling against Joe Darke.” Or he found out his beloved brother died humping a serial killer and lost his marbles. Either way.
Careful, Phoenix! Lana’s going to narc on your unethical office romance!
Well done, team!
To Lana’s surprise, since she’s ready to just live the rest of her life with SL-9 looming over her, Phoenix says, “That ‘case’ just might not be over yet.” I can’t even with those scare quotes. He doesn’t know how to use those at all. Phoenix wants to take a look at the scene of the crime, which Lana repeats for him was “the office that Damon Gant and I shared. The office that Mr. Gant now occupies by himself: the Chief’s office.” Wait, Gant still uses that office? Even though he got a huge promotion that theoretically came with a fancy new office, and a fucking murder took place there? That he didn’t want to move out should be a huge red flag to anyone with half a brain who has given this incident any thought at all. So, nobody.
Phoenix could simply cut through the criminal affairs department to get to Gant’s office, but for some fucking reason I decide to backtrack to the police department entrance first, and I pay for this immediately with the appearance of Jake Marshall and his goddamn wild west pony show music. Motherfucker. I don’t even know why he’s standing here, since he should be with Lana in the detention center, on charges of theft, fraud, assault, and being a stupid asshole. But pointing this out is not making him disappear in a puff of common sense smoke, so why bother? Marshall laments his bad fortune, mostly at being busted, but he also mentions, “I should’ve known my luck had run out when ol’ Billy dried up this morning.” Billy is the cactus in his office, not his penis, just to be clear. Though I guess it could be both. Anyway, they have caught Marshall just as he’s about to go “to the Prosecutor’s Office for a little interrogation.” Oh, so now that we don’t have to deal with him anymore, he’s dropped the “Prospector” bullshit. Obviously. And aren’t interrogations done at the police station? I give up. “It’s a ‘voluntary’ appearance,” he says with a smirk, “but we all know I won’t be coming back.” At least they’re getting around to arresting him when he feels like coming in! I shouldn’t be surprised after Meekins was free long enough to deliver news of his own “crime” to Edgeworth’s office, but still.
He was at the auction for his gay cowboy oil painting. It was a madhouse.
The “bad” news is that, with Marshall unavailable to chaperone, the evidence room is off limits, like that really mattered yesterday. He was doing such a good job guarding it! Like, look, I’d rather drink paint thinner than go in there again, but it’s pretty convenient that now Phoenix will never get one of his boyfriends in forensics to analyze the blood in there. Of course, that could have and should have been done already, but it wasn’t, because this case is stupid. The “good” news is that Marshall agrees to Phoenix’s request (fuck you, Phoenix!) to talk about SL-9 and how it led him to cosplaying as an MRA douche in a polka-dotted cravat.
Marshall offers a little more insight into the problems with the SL-9 evidence. “Some of the facts reported were inconsistent with the evidence we found,” he says. Wait, that is not insightful at all. Also, does he mean the evidence they found in Lana and Gant’s office, since no evidence was found otherwise? Did all five of the detectives on the case really cram in there together to go over the crime scene? Didn’t at least a couple of them have to stay in Darke’s cell so, once he escaped again, they could chase after him? Anyway, he says, “For example…the murder weapon.” Marshall confirms the broken switchblade that was stuffed in Edgeworth’s tailpipe was Darke’s switchblade, which just raises the question of how the fuck their suspect had access to his favored switchblade, one the police apparently knew was his, when he was in their custody. But somehow, this is not the problem: the problem is that Neil Marshall’s stab wound didn’t match that knife, but “that possibility had been erased” from the final autopsy report. So it wasn’t even the only weapon available to him? Seriously, this is the worst police department ever. If I ever murder someone–and that possibility is looking good right now–I want these guys in charge of the investigation.
Turning the conversation to his brother, he says, “I got the looks, but he got the brains.” Or they both got the looks and neither got the brains. Like everyone in this series. “He was one of the best prosecutors around.” So good, in fact, that we’ve never heard about him until now he was awarded the King of Prosecutors trophy on the day of his death. And that was the day of “the evidence transferal,” too, which, thanks to some kind of Stockholm Syndrome, I have coded into my brain at this point as common sense, no matter how stupid it still is, and I end up annoyed with Phoenix for replying, “…! Interesting…” Shut up, Phoenix, obviously that was the best day for evidence transferal, by which I mean the worst and dumbest day. I hate this case.
To review: that day Wunderkind Neil Marshall had to accept an award, help with the fucking evidence transferal, interrogate a serial killer, and die saving a detective’s teenage sister? Another busy day at the police department. Maybe they should try taking extra precautions against vicious stabbings on Evidence Transferal and Police Emmys Day. Marshall adds, frowning, that the Joe Darke case was their first working together, since he’d just made detective. “It was drizzling that morning, and by nightfall there was thunder,” he says, hat in hand. “I can’t believe two years have gone by already. I tried to steal the evidence so the case wouldn’t die.” Thanks for that, buddy. I’m so glad someone refused to let this case go away so I could experience it.