Chapter Text
She never remembered anything. Not the trials, not the attorneys, not the perpetrators. They were completely unremarkable. In the early stages of her career, y/n s/n often found herself looking back at her drawings, sketched as the court proceedings unfurled before her, and realising that she couldn’t recall the details of the case it depicted.
But that didn’t matter. Her drawings were merely a supplement to the story told by her employer, Global News—a subsidiary of Global Studios—and as long as she captured the scene in front of her on paper, that was all the mattered. y/n just needed to draw, and then her sketches would be shown on TV, in the newspaper, or wherever else Global News chose to report on the trial. She suspected she was pretty good at her job, and her suspicions were proven right when her mentor, Dot Misham, approached her one Wednesday afternoon.
“y/n.” She beamed. “I can’t tell you how pleased I am. I knew you had potential from the moment I saw your work, and now I know I’m right! Not like my ex-husband, who—”
y/n zoned out immediately. Dot Misham’s ex-husband, whom she herself had never met yet had mysteriously become far too familiar with, was apparently an artist himself. Only, he was failing, and, if Dot’s version of accounts was accurate, was in complete denial of it. After begging him to get another job and being met with refusal over and over, Dot had “no choice” but to eventually leave him, and find her own spot on the career ladder as a courtroom sketch artist. y/n had heard the story several times over because Dot liked to bring it up at every opportunity. Strangely, she felt somewhat of a kinship with the man. She too had struggled with accepting her own failure, and perhaps if this golden opportunity hadn’t come along, her partner (should he exist) would have left her too.
“—tomorrow?”
y/n suddenly realised Dot was blinking at her expectantly.
“Oh, um… Sorry?”
“I said, would you like to cover the von Karma case tomorrow?”
“V-Von Karma?” y/n gawked. “But that’s…that’s huge!”
“Exactly!” Dot’s eyes seemed to glitter. “You’ve made such progress though, and—I’ll be coming with you of course—I think you might be ready for it.”
“Then I’ll do it.” y/n’s reply was instantaneous. She knew better than to let an opportunity like this pass her by.
Manfred von Karma was a renowned prosecutor with a perfect record. He hadn’t lost a single case in almost forty years. His had to be the most well-known name within the prosecuting world. y/n knew of the rumours about him of course, but it had never been her place to cast judgement on the courtroom or its players. Her role was simply to observe. And the opportunity to observe a trial involving such a big name was more than anything she could hope for.
***
y/n’s heart hammered in her chest, and she licked her lips. The gallery was still chattering away. She was used to the noise. People liked to discuss the trial and its possible outcomes she supposed, although at this point the only information they had came from the media covering the arrest. That was one thing, but the chattering was different in another way this time. There was a tension running through it that was new to her. It must have been because he was coming. Prosecutor Manfred von Karma.
“Are you okay?”
y/n glanced to her side to see Dot smiling at her brightly. She nodded back to her mentor.
“Nervous?”
Again she nodded.
“You know, it’s not so different from your usual trials,” Dot reassured her. “It’s only the prosecutor who’s changed. It’s still just a larceny case, like any other.”
“I know,” y/n responded; despite what Dot said, the feeling in the air was markedly different. While she appreciated the attempt to calm her nerves, it was unfortunately a futile one.
Things remained tense until the judge stepped up to the bench. This was familiar. The judge always came in first, followed by the defence and prosecution on either side. That was when she first saw him.
The passage of time had not been kind to Manfred von Karma. His hair was silver; as it should be at his age, which y/n recalled was around sixty-five, but less typical was his skin. It was not just wrinkled, but twisted, as though moulded into that shape by a history of various facial expressions. Smirks, glares, and glowers, perhaps. Even when he kept his face neutral, those lines remained deep and kept him looking utterly fierce. An oppressive energy seemed to radiate from him, and his very entrance into the courtroom had rendered it silent. y/n found herself recoiling a little—that was, until Dot brought her back to earth with a jab of her elbow.
“Get drawing,” she whispered under her breath.
Flustered, y/n picked up her pastels and focused on the brown paper in front of her. The judge was easy to draw. She had encountered this elderly gentleman several times in the past, and knew what each of his expressions meant. The way he raised his eyebrows in surprise—but also confusion—or the way his features tightened slightly when he had consolidated an opinion in his mind. It was that tightening which often signaled the end phase of a trial.
The defence attorney too, was easy. He was a man y/n knew well, although he never left much of an impression on her. While she had to relearn his habits every time he appeared, their simplicity meant it never took very long.
Drawing people she knew was easy. Drawing someone totally new could sometimes be a challenge. Von Karma looked like he was definitely going to be a challenge.
There was the way he snapped his fingers to gain attention, the way he seemed to do most of the talking in the room, more so even than the judge. The trial was under his complete control, and his infamy was such that y/n knew what she expected him to be like. On the surface, he met her expectations; not least in the majesty of his dress and how he carried himself with a perfect posture.
But there was also something else. Something y/n hadn’t expected, and it wasn’t until midway through the trial when she finally figured it out.
This was it. This was what her job was about. She was an observer of the courtroom, and her role was to capture whatever she saw. Not just what she saw; what was there. Emotion. Humanity. Even if that came in unexpected places.
This trial was not unremarkable. This trial had taught her everything. Humans were more than their appearance. The defendant was more than their alleged crime, the attorney more than a defender of said defendant, and the prosecutor more than an amalgamation of justice. They were all human. Prosecutor von Karma had imparted a powerful desire to capture what she saw, more than anybody else. And she was determined to make the most of it.
***
“What do you think?”
The trial was over in less than a day. True to perfect form, Manfred von Karma had proved—perhaps with questionable methods—the defendant’s guilt. Over the course of the day, y/n had captured about fifteen moments throughout the trial. Five were perhaps misjudged, and did not need to be drawn. She was still learning how to calculate what to draw, and what could safely be ignored.
The post-trial period was much more peaceful now compared to her first years in the job. Back when she was freelancing, she had to go out to where the media was in a bid to sell her drawings. Now that she was working for Global News, her salary was guaranteed—the only question was whether they would choose to use her pictures, or Dot’s.
The two of them were in a quiet corridor of the courthouse, away from the noise of eager reporters and their cameras, and y/n was presenting her work to her mentor. She was confident; she really felt as though she was on to something with her epiphany.
Her hopes were dashed the moment she caught sight of the expression on Dot’s face as she rifled through y/n’s pictures.
“Oh… These are… Well, of course, you were nervous. It’s understandable…”
“Is there something wrong with them?” y/n asked anxiously.
Dot shook her head. “It’s nothing to worry about,” she began, “they’re just…not up to your usual standard.”
y/n was confused. In her mind, she had gone far beyond what she was normally capable of. “What do you mean?”
“Well, for example…” Dot pulled out one of the pieces. An image of von Karma, grinning at a particularly advantageous moment for the prosecution. “This one, see? Compare it to mine… Your Prosecutor von Karma looks a little too…soft.”
y/n studied the images side by side. She had to agree with Dot’s assessment. The difference came in the eyes. Dot’s von Karma looked savage; brutal in his arrogance. While y/n’s carried the same arrogance in the curl of his lip, his eyes did not come to such a sharp point—just as she had observed when she drew him. In her mind, Dot’s von Karma was almost cartoonish in his villain-like appearance. Hers was more down to earth.
“Do you see?” Dot prompted.
y/n nodded. “Mine looks softer…because that’s how he looks to me.”
Dot paused, clearly not having expected y/n’s statement. “You think that’s what he looks like? Soft? Are we talking about the same Prosecutor von Karma? That man is a beast!”
“Well, yeah, I know that’s what everyone says,” y/n said, “but that’s just…what I saw in that moment, I guess. He might be cruel and everything, but he’s a person too, right? I think that’s what I saw.”
“I see. I see what this is.” Dot nodded to herself. “Yes—y/n, I think there’s something you need to understand. Your previous work has been outstanding, and you captured those trials perfectly. Maybe it’s because you met with such a powerful character this time that you strayed a little from the path. There’s something I’d like you to remember. We are not drawing these images to be pretty, or to make any sort of statement. These images have the potential to make the evening news, or be in the papers. So they have to…align with what the public expects to see, and what Global News wants to portray. Do you see what I’m getting at?”
y/n nodded slowly. She could sort of see where this was going.
“Now, Global News has a strong relationship with the Prosecutor’s Office and the courts. Without that relationship, it would be much more difficult to pin down members of the office for interviews, get scoops as soon as possible, and even for us artists to get inside that courtroom. So the image Global News puts out, through our drawings, should align with what the Prosecutor’s Office wants too. When you picture a prosecutor, what comes to mind?”
y/n thought about it a moment. When she spoke again, she gave the answer she suspected Dot wanted to hear. Not necessarily what she had seen.
“Prosecutors are powerful.”
“Exactly!” Dot beamed brightly. “And our pictures have to reflect that. I’m sorry; yours is a lovely portrait, but we can’t have Prosecutor von Karma of all people looking soft. I’m afraid your drawings from today are unlikely to be used.”
“But I just drew what I saw—isn’t that what we’re supposed to do?” Defiance pushed y/n to talk back, but she tried her best not to let out the full force of it.
“Not in this career,” Dot replied. “If you were doing a study piece, perhaps. But as long as we have links with the media, we need to be careful. Besides…”
Dot trailed off, and took another look at y/n’s portrait of von Karma, before nodding to herself.
“Yes, I’m certain now. I don’t know what you saw in there, but Prosecutor von Karma is not capable of expressions like these. I can see you’ve tried to capture the cruelty and everything, but it’s far too weak. I suspect your eyes must have been playing tricks on you.”
“They weren’t!” y/n snapped before she could stop herself. She could understand omitting the gentleness in his expression to make the image look a certain way, but she couldn’t believe that it hadn’t existed in the first place.
Dot gave her a wry smile. “Then why do we never hear of the kind, generous Prosecutor von Karma? Why is he always ‘ruthless’? ‘Unwavering’?”
y/n opened her mouth, but nothing came out. She was struggling to find an answer.
“I’m a little disappointed today, y/n, but I know you can do better next time. If I find another opportunity to get you into a von Karma trial, I’m willing to take it. Just remember what we spoke about in the meantime, okay?”
y/n nodded, not able to meet Dot’s gaze.
“I think I should give these back to you then, and not submit them. If any of the higher-ups see this…version of Prosecutor von Karma you’ve drawn, it may colour their impressions of your future work. I’ll see you tomorrow.”
When Dot had left, y/n took another look through her drawings. It was just as her mentor had said. None of them was even half as powerful as Dot’s equivalent sketches, and it was always in the eyes. It wasn’t that y/n was incapable of drawing powerful expressions—she’d sketched her fair share of criminals who were undoubtedly guilty—it just seemed that a presence as powerful as von Karma’s brought out his vulnerabilities as a human even more. Had Dot not seen that? Or was y/n romanticizing things in her mind because she’d finally encountered a subject that piqued her curiosity? Perhaps it was an odd sense of altruism, a belief that no one person could be completely evil, especially not the man everyone insisted was heartless. She sighed; no matter how much time she spent pouring over the images in front of her, the answers were not forthcoming. Besides, it was getting late, and she would need something to eat soon.
y/n was just about to turn around and head home when a voice behind her caught her attention.
“Papa!”
Turning her head to look around a corner of the corridor, y/n saw him again: Prosecutor von Karma, and a young, silvery-haired girl who looked just a little out of breath. She looked to be in her mid-to-late teens.
“You were wonderful, Papa! I’m so glad I get to see you in action again! It’s been far too long.”
Papa? y/n thought. That must be his…daughter?
Von Karma chuckled. “Thank you, Franziska. Work hard and maybe one day you too will be able to pull off a similar feat. And know that I will accept nothing less.”
“But not before me.” Another voice spoke. It was only then that y/n realised there was a third person present, hidden behind von Karma—though she would have to bend further around the corner than she was comfortable doing to make out any detail. It was definitely a male voice, though; elegant and well-educated in its tone.
“Unlikely, Miles!” the girl snapped. “I passed the bar examination not long after you, and I’m seven years younger! That’s more than enough proof that I’m better than you, and always will be!”
“Now, now.” Von Karma patted the indignant girl on the head. “Save your arguing for the courtroom. For now, why don’t we stop at that restaurant you like so much for dinner?”
“Really, Papa? Oh, thank you! I’ve been wanting to eat out with you ever since I arrived back in the United States!”
“We can go to karaoke afterwards too.”
That was it, y/n suddenly realised. The softness she had seen in von Karma during the trial. The gentleness—it came from his role as a father. In the courtroom he was harsh and demanding, and for all she knew he was a strict, stoic father as well. But if there was one thing she was confident of, it was that there was love for his daughter in his heart. She had seen it.
“Papa, when we get there, will you tell me how exactly you tracked down the defendant?” the girl, Franziska, asked eagerly.
y/n suddenly realised the girl’s voice was getting louder, and the threesome was coming this way. Worried it would look like she was eavesdropping—in fact, she supposed she had been eavesdropping—she quickly drew her head back from around the corner and pressed her back against the wall behind her. It wasn’t as though she’d done anything wrong necessarily, but if there was one person whose bad side she wanted to avoid, it was Manfred von Karma.
y/n had nearly finished sighing with relief as the group passed by, not noticing her. That same sigh caught in her throat again as the third party, seeming to sense her, suddenly spun around and looked right at her.
A pair of steely-grey eyes locked with hers. They obliterated every thought in her mind at once, including any thought of making excuses. Even when they quickly swept up and down her body as if evaluating her, her thoughts stayed gone. And when his eyes returned y/n’s gaze again, they seemed to be full of questions—and something else. Before she had time to pick up on what that something else was, their owner had turned and was following after the other two in the party again. Apparently he had decided she wasn’t a threat of any kind.
y/n finally let out the rest of her sigh, trying to calm her racing heartbeat. She had been so distracted by that man, Miles’—the name sounded oddly familiar—gaze that she hadn’t had the wherewithal to take in many more of his features. She studied his back as he retreated, and could make out his dark hair and burgundy suit. But the rest of him remained a mystery.