"What, were you hallucinating? If you were doing drugs on my property I'll never forgive you," Miles teased as Phoenix's hand fell from his face, a startled frown appearing;
"No, I was... You were..." Phoenix's cheeks quickly became rose-tinted as he cleared his throat, glancing away with words clogging his throat. The subject was quickly altered:
"Why'd you come? Am I in trouble?"
"I have no idea where you got the notion of being in trouble from. It's not as though I received various reports of you slacking off of your duties and refusing to attend reeducation lessons today," Miles smiled, radiating smugness at the grinning man beneath him.
"Guilty." Phoenix responded with a mirroring smile before pausing:
"Am I actually in trouble though, or-"
"No." Instead of the condescending posture he'd previously assumed, staring down at the other, Miles had now favoured perching on the side of the bed, allowing Phoenix to assume a sitting position and face him - an offer which the other graciously took him up on.
"I came because I thought they'd moved you to a different room. I wanted to check."
"At 3 in the morning."
"It was on my mind." Miles hesitantly replied, awkwardly locking his hands together and looking to the side for a brief moment, feeling his own skin burning. Phoenix studied him for a moment, tilting his head comically, before letting out a hearty laugh which almost put Miles into cardiac arrest.
"For someone who runs a country based on lies, you're surprisingly awful at lying," The silvery-haired man's words rushed out pointedly at the spiky-haired man at that:
"One: they're not my lies, they're Saviour Von Karma's ancestors'," A breath.
"Two: who says they're lies?"
"Being gay isn't a disease, Miles," Phoenix chuckled - mockingly.
"There are other laws besides the homophobic ones, you know. Functional ones."
"Cool, so let's just ignore the people being slaughtered, right?" The words being spurted by the other man were so viciously correct, but his undying smile was somehow stopping them from getting very far: forget a hallucinogenic Phoenix Wright, was Leader Edgeworth even there any more? Miles self-consciously prodded his forehead, wondering the same thing, to find that he felt shockingly vacant. Maybe even at peace.
"That's not what I meant," He softly countered, his voice wavering (on the edge of night-time euphoria?).
"Why aren't they your ancestors, by the way?"
"Huh?"
"You said they were Von Karma's ancestors." Phoenix was directly looking at him now. It felt surreal being there, at what was now almost 4am, sitting and chatting with a friend who was genuinely interested and could understand him - in a literal and wishy-washy sense.
"Saviour Von Karma, to you. I know you have permission to defame me, but you can't defame the dead."
"Saviour Von Karma, then."
"I'm not directly related to the original family. Saviour Von Karma adopted me after... An incident." A moment of silence.
"You lost your family?" Gingerly spoken.
"My father,"
"I'm so sorry." Locking eyes with the other apologetically, as if to seek permission, Phoenix slowly and shakily gave Miles's shoulder a comforting squeeze and didn't probe for any details. Miles was grateful.
"It's not your fault, but thank you." He felt light, his shoulder tingling, and everything was warm.
"Saviour Von Karma taught me everything I know about diplomacy, politics, sophistication... Types of tea." Phoenix snorted at that last one, his grip slipping before being stopped by Miles's own warm hand. Was Phoenix feeling it too?
"Are you single?"

Miles immediately went 4 shades of red after blurting out the ridiculous, preposterous, inexpedient question. What the hell was he thinking? Repulsed by whatever had possessed him to ask a question with such heavy connotations, he instantly tried to rectify the situation:
"I'm sorry, I didn't mean-" But Phoenix didn't seem to mind.
"No, it's fine. I get that you're not interested - you're not gay." What was that supposed to mean? Miles would gnaw off his own finger if it were possible at that moment.
"You're just curious, right?"
"Y-Yes." He lopsidedly smiled and hoped he didn't sound as fake as he felt even though he genuinely wasn't interested. At all. He was straight.
"I'm not single," Miles nodded curtly, unable to look him in the eye.
"I'm actually bi, by the way," Phoenix paused, looking at his free hand with solemnity.
"I guess I can tell you, since you opened up to me," Phoenix pleadingly looked for an indication of acceptance from the other - one which he never received, since the other wouldn't even look at him. He continued anyway:
"There was this girl called Dahlia Hawthorne. My first partner." When faced with the unprecedented cracking of a voice, the sorrow within it apparent, something made the ashamed Miles look. Phoenix was distant, pale. That idiotic strike he'd started had clearly weakened him.
"She tried to murder me. Then frame me for murder. It was kind of traumatic, so I guess that's why I don't try with girls anymore."
"Phoenix, that's... I'm so-"
"Don't. It's fine." Phoenix smiled wanly.
"Let's forget about it, okay?"
"Ok." A painful silence ensued, everything ached, everything felt like murder or slander or a massive headache. It wasn't appropriate, but Miles couldn't stop himself from asking:
"Who's your partner, then?"
"Kristoph Gavin," Phoenix looked away briefly before his attention returned.
"Are you crying?"

Miles gaped stagnantly, something trickling down his cheek.
"No."