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Chapter Text

The Pink Line train rattles on its track as it hurls itself towards Gear Station. Inside the lead car, the fluorescent overheads flicker off as a Snorlax slams down and lets loose an earthquake that barrels towards his opponents, Chandelure and Excadrill. Other than the brief, electric yellow flashes of tunnel safety lights rushing by, only Chandelure's dim purple glow is left to light the battle. Emmet grins. 

Today's challenger, a boy with flyaway blonde hair whose name Emmet hasn't forgotten but rather hadn't committed to memory, grimaces. Practiced, Emmet pauses, relaxes his smile into something less hungry, and says, "Safety first! The back-up lights take four seconds to power on."

On cue, white light floods the car and Emmet wastes no more time making his next move. The Staraptor, unfazed by the earlier earthquake, is not so resistant to Excadrill's rock slide. Hit, Staraptor squawks, then falls, enveloped in the red glow of his pokeball as he careens to the floor. 

That leaves the Snorlax. So far, he has used earthquake and body slam. The latter served to teach Emmet's challenger that Chandelure is a ghost type, confirming a suspicion that the kid must be a foreigner. The former was effective, as well as revelatory. His Pokemon's earthquakes never caused issues with the lighting, but when compared to a Snorlax, even Haxorus was fairly small. While the back-up lights worked as designed, such measures should be reserved for emergencies, rather than battle externalities. Emmet would have to investigate, perhaps invest in more resilient lights or wiring for the cars.  

After the matter at hand, of course. Subway Master may only require one hat, but the Battle Master was a very different job from the Chief Transportation and Engineering Officer. Both required his 100% focus, commitment, and effort. Nothing less than perfection is acceptable. 

First the battle. Then the lights. 

The Snorlax pulls himself up from his hunched position, dissuading Emmet of the notion that it may use rest next. A signature move would make sense, but perhaps Chandelure's overheat had done less damage than he thought. Still, another earthquake would--

Emmet's challenger must have yelled a command, because with sudden, startling speed, the Snorlax lunges towards Chandelure, maw wide. Its unhinged jaw and teeth too sharp all an indication of a dark type move that Emmet fails to anticipate. Snorlax crunches down with a sound like shattering glass and Emmet is already switching Chandelure, fainted, out for Haxorus. 

Stupid. 

Stupid. 

He needs to pay attention. He shouldn't have let Chandelure down.

Emmet catches himself. Later. There would be time for that later. He checks his smile and sends Haxorus into the fray with a point and flourish. 

As Haxorus transitions into battle, Emmet sends Excadrill ahead with another rock slide. Without needing a command, Haxorus follows with a fierce dragon claw. Both the Snorlax and his trainer start to look cornered. Earthquake wielded by a Pokemon that size is an advantage, likely able to take Excadrill out in the next round while also damaging Haxorus in the process. But Haxorus is fresh, and Snorlax is slow. 

Crunch was a surprise, but unless he’s wrong about rest, Emmet knows how this would play out. It would be good timing, too, with the service due to approach Gear Station in three minutes and 22 seconds. 

The trainer yells again, and the car begins to shake with another earthquake. Emmet can’t help but laugh, giddy with weightlessness as he sways with the train finding its bearings again, catching himself on a strap loop just as the wheelset beneath them locks back onto the track. This earns a strange look from his challenger, but Excadrill is still standing, Haxorus is going in for a vicious swipe, and he can’t help it. Emmet loves to win. 

The rest of the car rights itself and Snorlax goes down with a groan. Over the intercom, the automated announcer notifies them of Gear Station inbound. Emmet recalls his pokemon and thrusts out his hand. 

"I am Emmet. I won against you. But this is not the end. I am sure you will show up here again." 

Shaking off the defeat, the boy bounds forward and takes the proffered handshake. "Oh, for sure," he agrees, "Double battles are so cool, and they don't say you're the best for nothing, huh?" 

Emmet beams at the insight that his challenger agrees with him about double battles, and maybe a bit at the flattery. Deciding there that he should remember this one's name, he tries to recall their introductions. The kid doesn't seem to mind the pause, still talking and shaking his hand. 

"You know, I was actually thinking, I heard that the Orange and Yellow lines are outfitted for Multi Battles, and that up until, uh, a few years ago, maybe, you were running Multi Battle Circuits? I'm in town with my dad, and he's a big shot trainer back home. Any chance those lines ever run?"

Emmet freezes, and drops the kid's hand. It's not intentional, certainly not on script, but he's suddenly stopped in his tracks and that alone is enough to derail him. He can't think of an answer. He can't think at all. All of the information he needs is at the station and he's stalled out, the platform out of reach. 

The train, the real one rather than his short-circuiting brain, is coming to a slow stop and he needs to answer this question so they can go their separate ways. 

"The Yellow and Orange Lines," he starts slowly, willing his brain to catch up, "are…" 

The train comes to a stop, jostling Emmet and the kid as the brakes catch and pull. In the beat after the train brakes but before the doors open, Emmet remembers. 

"...Are open for transit passengers only. We do not run Multi Battle lines. We have not run Multi Battle circuits since the Battle Subway opened for trainers. That is a very interesting suggestion. We will take it into consideration for the future!"

The doors whoosh open behind them and the comforting din of Platform 3 is calling. Emmet smiles, practiced, bids his challenger a good day, and heads forward into the station alone. 

"You look tired.”

Evening light bathes Nimbasa in a hazy coral glow, gentle and still, and the pedestrian-only avenue they're seated at is too quiet to afford Emmet the opportunity to ignore Elesa's point. The three of them--Emmet, Elesa, and Chandelure--are seated outdoors at a cafe of Elesa's choice with two orders of bubble tea and a rare summer evening without obligations. To buy himself time, Emmet lays a finger atop the opening of the comically large straw to transport a boba from his drink to one of Chandelure's candle flames. It may not be spirits or souls, but she trills in delight and in a burst of cold flame the little tapioca ball vanishes. 

Across the table, Elesa leans on a folded hand and looks at Emmet expectantly. 

So, Emmet smiles. "I faced some very tough challengers today," he says, not technically lying. "The Brown Line to Anville required repairs after a Drilbur disruption as well. Lots of work today!" 

Elesa tilts her chin up and looks past him, briefly. "Why don't you have someone else take over the maintenance?" 

"It's my job," Emmet replies, confused. 

"Then hire someone on to take over some of the battling. You do battles circuits on four separate lines, and you don't even like single battles. Surely there's someone--" 

"No." 

Elesa startles, blinking wide at him, and Emmet regrets not catching the chill that seeps into his tone. Elesa should know, though. They've had this conversation before. 

"I'm sorry, Elesa. We were selected for this role specifically. I am Emmet, the Subway Master. There's no one else." Emmet doesn't say that giving over the Singles Circuits to someone else, some stranger, simply because he wasn't managing his time and health well enough would be unacceptable. The answer was far simpler: Emmet would have to do better. 

With a dramatic sigh, Elesa returned to her drink and mimicked Emmet's method of feeding Chandelure boba. "The kid that reached you on the Super Doubles posted the battle video online. Chandelure took quite the hit, didn't she?" Elesa says, then must catch something that Emmet's expression betrays as she quickly adds, "No, no. Not like that. Just, listen to you. Talking about getting the job as a "we". You and your Pokemon. I mean, come on Emmet, you already maintain an active team large enough for two trainers. I know you've got it handled, but I just don't think you have to do it all alone.”

In lieu of responding and betraying how his throat has closed up around his voice, Emmet smiles softly. It's practiced but real, his best way of saying I hear you, and thank you, but I am fine. 

With a sip of tea, he swallows hard and changes the subject. "You watch my battles?" 

Elesa barks out a laugh and says, "Emmet, you have your win record against me memorized to exacting detail and I've known you for 15 years." It's without venom, and accurate. Emmet refrains from asking whether she intends to challenge the subway again soon. For all her concern about his workload, she's as busy as he is between her role as Nimbasa City Gym Leader and her modelling. Perhaps she could leverage her role to circumvent the required points needed to face Emmet on the lines, but they both know she'd never consider it. Like Emmet, she is all or nothing when it came to battling. 

Unfortunately, it turns out Elesa is also all or nothing when it comes to her friendships. Regardless of the change of conversational tracks, she does not let her concern for Emmet's wellbeing drop and by the end of their drinks she had declared that she would be staying with Emmet that night. 

Emmet, for what it's worth, does not put up a fight. Maybe he was tired, after all. It turns out that Elesa had made plans for boba that evening with a mission, overnight bag already packed and dinner pre-ordered for takeaway at Emmet's favorite ramen shop. The only concession in Emmet's favor is the trip to his apartment via the subway, which gives him the opportunity to check in with some of the Depot crew to ensure everything is running smoothly for the overnight shift.

He notices that Elesa and some of the more senior staff are on first-name bases. Elesa does, at least, look sheepish when Emmet asks her about it later. 

"Oh, just part of my Gym Leader duties, you know?" 

Emmet decides to save that conversation for later. 

The journey is fairly short, and accompanied by the standard amount of attention Gym Leader Elesa and Subway Master Emmet draw in public places. One particularly plucky little girl challenges them to a battle, and Emmet finds himself running through his script about Multi Battles for a second time that day before Elesa elbows him and hands the child a small enamel pin. "A promise for later," she says, petting the girl's equally plucky Emolga. "Come get the real one when you go one your journey."

When they arrive at his apartment, Elesa drops onto his couch with her ramen while Emmet starts to release his Pokemon to feed them their dinner first. With her mouth full of noodles, Elesa says, "I, for one, am glad that you don't run Multi Battle circuits. Four lines is enough, don't you think?" 

Once again, suddenly Emmet is lost. He stops, the bulk-sized bag of feed dragging his now-limp arms towards the floor with the same gravitational pull that drags down the pit of his stomach. Where his script, his knowledge, his wherewithal should be is only void. And the void is cold and empty and lonely, reason enough to always stay in motion so that it can never catch up to him, not like this. What is he supposed to do when it jumps out at him like this, like he's a child in the tall grass with no partner to protect him? Just like that, like then, Emmet knows if he stays then the hurt will find him next. There’s no one here, this time, to save him. 

A hand on his shoulders, gripping hard and shaking, pulls him back. The blood pumping in his ears sounds like spilling sand but he's beginning to make out a voice calling his name. He blinks, once, twice, before his sight returns in sharp lines and too much color. Elesa's blue eyes flood his field of vision. With something to focus on, to ground him, his first coherent thought is that he has worried her again. It's his least convincing display of being fine yet. 

Emmet doesn't know what happened. He also doesn't know whether telling Elesa that would be better or worse. So, he scrubs a hand over his face, slow enough to count to three, and breathes deep. "Sorry, Elesa, I just zoned out," he says, and smiles. 

Elesa looks unconvinced. She releases her grip on one of his shoulders and brings the back of that hand to his forehead, before pulling back with a start. "Do you usually break into a cold sweat when you zone out, Emmet?" 

"I have not thought to check".

"Emmet," Elesa hisses, forcing them both to maintain eye contact for a breath before she grabs his hand and pulls him to the couch. "Sit down. Eat your ramen. I'll feed everyone," and before he can protest she puts a still-warm takeaway bowl of ramen in his hands and marches back to the kitchen.

It's not long before she's humming softly and Emmet relaxes back into the couch, conceding to the particular solace found in Elesa's company. She's demanding and inflexible, but her presence never asks more of him than he can give. There's no need for small talk or pleasantries, conversations either wholly genuine or they enjoy comfortable silences as easy as breathing. She's gentle with his masks and he with hers, knowing when they're needed and when they're safe to come down. Like siblings, perhaps. 

Emmet wonders if he'd be a good brother. 

If today is anything to go by, perhaps he's more trouble than he's worth. 

After the Pokemon are fed, Elesa returns to the couch and leans on Emmet's shoulder. She idles on the TV menu for a time before selecting a Sinnoan training stream and laying the controller on the coffee table next to her cold broth. It's background noise more than anything, but neither of them talk. Emmet leans his head on hers while they watch the streamer's Floatzel progress from aqua tail to hydro pump. They both know, and neither comment, that most Floatzel would be better off sticking with aqua tail, favoring attack over special attack. It's still momentous when the Floatzel pulls forth gallons of water with pressure enough that it snaps the oak tree it had been slashing at for hours clean in half. Both Emmet and Elesa cheer with the streamer, the latter clambering forward to grab the remote to spam emotes in the chat and, without asking, subscribe to the channel. There's only 118 viewers, but luckily the trainer takes the handle "SubwayMasterEmmet" to demarcate a fan, rather than the man himself. Emmet receives copious thank yous from the trainer, just a kid, and the Floatzel. 

Elesa laughs herself breathless upon learning that all of Emmet's online handles are some variation of his name and job title. They argue about online identities, and Emmet learns that Elesa has various sub-accounts on social media, unverified, that she uses to shitpost. Elesa steals his phone from him before he can follow the accounts, claiming, fairly, that people might connect the dots if Emmet_SubwayMaster started following her. 

Eventually, and Emmet suspects on account of a certain Chandelure, they decide it's time for bed. Elesa decides this is the opportunity to start complaining about his apartment. 

First, "Emmet, remind me why you have no mirrors? No wonder you look so old, you can't do a skincare routine by force of will." Emmet replies that he does everything in his life by force of will. 

Second, "You know, Emmet, traditionally guest rooms are outfitted with neutral decor. Yours is, uh, the Emmet-equivalent of a kid with a racecar bed and Zebstrika sheets. This might as well be your own room". 

Third, "Emmet, Civil Engineering and the Nimbasa Subway System is not light bedtime reading, why is it on your guest bed stand? And, is it bookmarked? Emmet, do you leave recommendations for your guests in your Civil Engineering textbooks?" 

Emmet was tempted to rise to the challenge, but he honestly didn't remember leaving that book out, or what he may have marked. Instead, he tells Elesa that he will try for better decor and reading material in the future. She smiles and catches him off guard yet again, laughing, "No, Emmet, don't ever change". 

They say good nights, return the willing Pokemon to their pokeballs and allow the others to settle for the night. Just Emmet's luck, Galvantula is out for the night and she's a snorer. So to the rhythm of her chittering and wheezing, Emmet eventually falls asleep. 

When Emmet dreams, he remembers. 

Four years, five months, and eighteen days ago, Ingo disappeared and the world forgot. 

Emmet forgot. 

Emmet would know how long, down to the second, had he been awake, but time grows formless in his dreams and he loses track. He knew that there had been two days, three hours, ten minutes and 32 seconds between losing Ingo and forgetting. The miasma of dream time tends to carry him to those days. 

A regularly scheduled lunch break not met with an always-on-schedule brother sent Emmet to the Dark Green Line train to investigate, vibrating with excitement about what kind of battle could keep Ingo so occupied as to miss an obligation. 

His brother was not there. His Pokemon were left behind, wild and restless, apparently unable to be controlled until Emmet had arrived. 

Police were called, and it doesn't take long in an initial investigation for the lead detective to float the word 'dead'. Emmet punched him, broke his nose. In the dream of this memory he knows he broke his hand, too, but can never feel the pain of it. 

He feels everything else though. He, and not the cop who shoves him back, hard, into a wall, is put on mandatory leave and referred to a doctor who he does not get the chance to see before forgetting. His uncle comes to Nimbasa to throw his weight around, to involve himself in the investigation without asking. He is miles down a subway tunnel looking for a nephew he can't recall when he forgets. 

Emmet reads a book and learns how to pray. He asks very nicely once, then grows increasingly desperate. Elesa visits. He has a breakdown. 

They forget. The void that swallowed Ingo came back and took what was left of Emmet’s brother in their memories. Whatever it was had no power over dreams, but morning would always come and with it the loss again and again, never knowing. Ad nauseum, for four years, five months, and sixteen days. 

Tonight, he dreams of remembering but still never finding his brother, of a world of people with the same broken face as that detective but saying over and over again dead, dead, dead, dead. They speak with the voices of every challenger he's ever faced and then finally his own voice and say Ingo is dead, your brother is dead, you're alone and you always will be .

He wants to cry. He wants to scream. But he's got no voice and no script for this grief that he hasn't been permitted to live through. Instead he curls inward on himself and wonders if he died that day or maybe two days after. Was his life since some sort of purgatory? Is that why, even when he is awake and doesn't know what he had lost, he is so damn sad? 

The taunting bleeds together, caconophous voices once again, until it grows indecipherable. Emmet is standing in a subway car and the voices are the rush of air as the train hurtles down the track. His opponent is Ingo, older but still him, frown stern but his eyes soft and sad. 

They never fought against each other on the subway but it feels natural to call out Galvantula as Ingo calls Chandelure. Instead of a command, Emmet yells across the row, "Did you leave on purpose?" 

Galvantula attacks with x-scissor. It's a bad match, but Chandelure takes the hit and Ingo does not respond. 

"Why haven't you come home?" 

Galvantula attacks with wild charge. Chandelure trills weekly and looks to her trainer, her partner, but Ingo does not respond. 

"Did you forget me, too?" 

This time, Galvantula doesn't move. Chandelure bobs in the air, trills, and waits for a command. Ingo, a mirror image of his twin even now, scrubs his hand over his face in a bid for time. Emmet counts to three. 

"Oh, Emmet," Ingo says, too quiet, "What are we going to do?" 

Emmet wakes up gasping for breath as Galvantula and Elesa rush into his room. 

Elesa's familiarity with Emmet's staff turns out to be part of a larger plot. On the Xtransceiver, his Chief of Staff informed him that Emmet had booked leave weeks ago, and that the Battle Circuits were closed until his return. Even if he did return, he was assured, there would be no challengers awaiting him. As for the maintenance and operations, the Chief hit him with a careful "I'm certain you have faith in the staff you've carefully trained to complete any required work in your capacity while you're out, correct?" 

Emmet withers, dies, and revives a man intending to excel at taking time off. To convince Elesa, who had shadowed him since Galvantula awoke her early this morning, that he was a renewed person, he prepares himself for a city jog. 

After she was done laughing at what she called his "athleisure getup", Elesa informs him that they had plans in Mistralton City, and that their ride was arriving shortly. 

Emmet gapes at Elesa. "You mean...?" 

Elesa winces and steps out his space, busying herself with packing. "I'm really sorry," she says from across the room, sounding not particularly apologetic. "I know it's not ideal but it beats walking?" 

"Elesa," Emmet says, now a time for a practiced smile if ever. "Have you ever heard of trains?" His teeth hurt, clenching like this. Elesa shoves a bag into his arms, heavier than it should be for a short jaunt to Mistralton. 

"Elesa?" 

After this morning, Emmet had wanted to be on his best behavior. Waking up needing to be brought down from an anxiety attack was, well, not the best look for someone trying to prove they were fine and didn't need any help. Elesa had clearly been rattled, and admitted that she wanted him to take some time off and that his staff agreed. She claims that she had closed the Gym for a bit and made some plans, that it would be fun. 

Lost at the edge of a panic he didn't understand, it was easy to agree that fun could be good. Different could be good.

Not change, of course, but a pause. 

"Elesa, I--" 

There was a knock at the door. Elesa is there before Emmet could blink, and now Skyla is in his apartment. The girls hug, Skyla lifting Elesa off her feet and spinning her around in the air before approaching Emmet. 

"Please don't spin me.”

Skyla laughs and puts her hands on her hips, "Hi to you, too, Emmet. I hear you need wings to Mistralton?" 

Emmet's smile slips and his gaze slides over Skyla's shoulder to Elesa, who shrinks backwards. "Yeah, uh, Sky, I haven't gone over all the details with Emmet yet, so," she says. 

Emmet takes a breath, intending to sigh but catching himself, and shakes his head. "I know enough! Better to stick to schedule. I'm sure timing is important when taking to the skies," he says, aiming for casual. "May I complete safety checks on our carriers?" 

Safety checks for flying Pokemon largely turns out to be admiring Skyla's team of flyers. Skarmory would fly Emmet, Swanna Skyla, and Braviary Elesa. It's Emmet's first meeting with Skyla's Skarmory, and she seems to sense his nerves. Without prompting, the Skarmory holds out her wings for inspection, and listens with rapt attention and sharp eyes as Emmet rambles about her aerodynamics and durability as a steel and flying Pokemon. 

Elesa and Skyla do not complain as he inspects Swanna and Braviary, though the Braviary clearly takes offense, perhaps on Skyla's behalf. Emmet knows, logically, that Skyla was an expert flyer and trainer, but in his line of work there was no excuse for overlooking a safety check. Confidence was no better excuse than incompetence. 

Checks complete, Emmet nods tightly and points sharply towards the front door. "All Aboard!" Putting his unease aside, he straps his ten pokeballs to his belt, slings his bag over his shoulder, and steps beyond the threshold of his apartment.

Shortly thereafter, miles above Nimbasa, Emmet marvels at how the shape of the city echoed the stretches of tunnels and lines beneath it. It was beautiful, his subway like the veins of a sleeping giant. Flying might not be his favorite, but it was unmatched at granting perspective. 

The three land later in Mistralton, closer to the fields than the runway. It takes Emmet 25 minutes and 43 seconds there to consider returning to Nimbasa immediately, even if by foot.

Iris meets them at the restaurant Skyla picks for lunch. The reservation for four should have been enough to send Emmet running, but he had been on the adrenaline come down and frankly assumed the fourth was Skarmory, who had yet to return to her pokeball after Emmet's first five minutes on the ground involving peeling him, finger by finger, free of the death grip he had around her neck. 

"Emmet!" Iris cries when she sees him, throwing her arms around him. It’s not that Emmet isn't happy to see his cousin. In fact, seeing Iris usually ensured that the alternative, seeing and being lectured on his health by Uncle Drayden, was out of the question. One of the two was always stationed in Opelucid. Seeing Iris wouldn't normally be a problem at all. 

So once he recovers, he returns the hug with ease. Into his shoulder, Iris says "I'm sure Dad is going to be so happy to see you!" 

Emmet knows that Iris can read right through his practiced expressions, so, still holding the hug but shifting to make eye contact with Elesa, he says, "I'm sure he will. Funny thing, I didn't know I was going to see Uncle Drayden? Why in Mistralton?" 

Iris leans back, rocking on her heels and looking at him with wide-eyed innocence that Emmet starts to suspect bely some involvement in this all. "Didn't you know? Dad is in Sinnoh! We're flying you there today.”

Chapter Text

“Ingo, I have a theory.”

Akari lies on the sand of the Training Grounds as she says this, looking not at Ingo but at the gathering clouds above Jubilife Village. Ingo crouchs down not far from her, near the centerpoint of the makeshift arena. He applies a revive to Gliscor, followed by a super potion, and watches fondly as Akari's Sylveon paws at her uniform top one, two, three times before climbing onto her chest and settling down. 

Warmth spreads in Ingo's chest as this strange girl reminds him yet again of another world where such friendships with Pokemon were the norm. Hisui has made much progress, in no small part due to Akari's presence here. Still, this world he almost remembered must have been so utterly different, if the fragments he recalls of it are to be believed. 

Ingo draws himself up, frowning deeper as the joints of his knees snap, and recalls Gliscor. Akari stays on the ground, Sylveon proving the true victor of the morning, but she cranes her neck to look at Ingo. 

Ingo considers. "Where do you anticipate this theory will take us?" 

"Well," Akari draws out, tickling under Sylveon's chin. "I had planned on it taking us to a picnic, but it looks like it's going to rain?" 

By now, Ingo feels that he knows Akari fairly well. In the aftermath of the rifts and the events with Volo, she had relaxed her guard enough for Ingo to recognize the facade she had kept up through her early months in Hisui. Ingo is proud of the confidence with which she now wields her voice. Not only does Akari remind him of the world behind him, but she has taught him that this new life need not stall his course. He, too, can grow. Everything did not end that day he found himself alone in the Icelands. 

It strikes him, then, to hear a catch of uncertainty in her voice. Had she not utterly swept him moments before, perhaps he could blame the battle. But her Samurott and Sylveon had taken down his team, unfavorable type matches notwithstanding, so it seems unlikely to have been a particularly taxing match on her part. 

"Akari," He starts, careful to ensure his voice is at an appropriate volume. "I see no reason why rain would impose a delay, so I propose we stay on schedule. If this is a theory that requires a picnic, Prelude Beach is quiet and close enough that should the rain impact our journey, we can return here with haste." 

A moment passes and Ingo worries that he's made light of her concerns. As quick as the notion arises, Akari assuages his fears with a soft smile and a softer “okay.” She hoists up Sylveon, who makes a small mrrrp of protest, and climbs to her feet. With her hands occupied, rising from her position on her back proves challenging, and Ingo is quick to steady her as she nearly tumbles back to the ground. "Safety first," he remarks, habitual and too loud.

Akari snorts. "It's a wonder anyone ever thought you were from here. On and on about safety and yet you treat Alpha Pokemon like old friends."

"They haven't proven otherwise, all things considered." 

Neither comment that they both met no shortage of close calls out in the Hisuian wilderness, with Pokemon Alpha and otherwise. It was in the past, and they had survived. 

Akari places Sylveon on the ground and gently bops its nose, before looking outward down the hill toward town. She gave no indication of returning her pokemon to its ball, which would remind him of the Pearl Clan had it not been odd for Akari, who tended to be as diligent as Ingo himself with pokeballs. 

However, Akari takes off towards Floaro Main Street with Sylveon perfectly at pace behind her. Ingo looks once more over the Training Grounds, ensuring everything is in its place, and follows. They make an odd pair, Hisui's hero and Ingo, stooped in his strange, tattered clothes. Today, the looks they're given as they cross Canala Avenue are not unkind. Ingo considers himself lucky, still, to have regained Jubilife's trust. Another blessing from Akari, for which he has no means to return the favor. 

Fog wisps low on the path that slopes from Practice Fields to Prelude Beach. It's colder here than in town, but the breeze is soft and the salt air is fresh and welcoming. For so long, Hisui for Ingo had been synonymous with the Coronet Highlands and the Pearl Settlement. A cold region throughout, Hisui's frigid north had left Ingo with ice settled deep in his bones, frozen and stiff. Never one to relax, perhaps, Ingo nonetheless found himself at ease here in Hisui's gentler western reach. 

The fog accompanies them to the outlet, mingling with the low tide waves. Akari, with a flourish, unrolls a straw mat onto the sand. Sylveon assists, in her way, pouncing onto any lumps until the surface is mostly flat. Ingo, rebuffed upon offering to help, watches as Akari uncouples a tiered box, revealing trays, utensils, and two smaller compartments filled with rice balls, neatly placed in lines of three. 

Akari catches his stare and says, "Rei made me the box. It isn't quite right, too old-fashioned, but the idea is right. I remember my mom, I think, making me loads of these whenever I'd visit. They travel well, or something." She reaches across the picnic set to pat the other end of the mat. "Come on, sit down and try some." 

Ingo does. The mat crinkles underneath him as he sits cross-legged and reaches for one of the containers. The dumplings were not dissimilar to the grain cakes that he had seen Galaxy Team members use to lure Pokemon, but the rice had been cooked dry, and shaped into small triangles with smooth edges. Time and care had gone into making these, and Ingo can't help but notice the dish Akari had placed closer to herself had the slightly more misshapen ones of the bunch. 

Without further delay, Ingo takes a bite. Akari watches him intently. 

It's good. Well and truly. They're undeniably Hisuian, carefully cooked hearty grains with a touch of salt from the mountainside. But, as always with Akari, there's something unexpected underneath, here an earthy flavor and flaky texture that Ingo can't identify, hidden amidst the grains. "Bravo, Akari! This is excellent." 

Akari's expectant stare falls to the mat and Ingo curses himself for responding incorrectly. He rushes to apologize, but Akari stops him with a flustered wave of her hands and genuine, if small, smile. "No! I'm really glad you like it. It's just," she pauses, looks down at Sylveon and then out to the water. Ingo begins to understand. "I hoped it might be familiar to you, too."

"Your theory?" Ingo asks, following her gaze to the water. The waves were picking up as morning wore on. 

"Yeah."

She does not elaborate. Ingo is patient. 

Together they watch the ocean meet the sand, Ingo deciding to release Gliscor to allow Sylveon some less pensive company. The two Pokemon engage in a mock battle at the water's edge, antithetically to Gliscor's serious nature. Ingo supposes Akari's Pokemon are much like her in that way. 

After Sylveon, ever dramatic, plays dead after a poorly aimed mud bomb stains her coat, Akari speaks around a rice ball, "I think I battled you, once. Before Hisui." 

Ingo freezes, and does not reply. He trusts Akari's memory, but not once in the year he's known her has Ingo recalled a battle with Akari in the world from before. 

She continues, "I've been trying to confirm it, with our morning battles. I've been waiting for another part of the memory to hit. It's hard, cause I've known you so long now here and everything blends together. But I'm so sure."

"I suspected you had ulterior motives, given you've well surpassed my abilities," Ingo says as pieces fall into place. For six weeks now, Akari had been unusually routine with their battles. Ingo lost every one. 

"Well," she replies with a laugh, "ulterior is harsh. Battling you reminds me of home. My motives are entirely benign." She gives Gliscor a nibble of her last rice ball while she says this, as if to underscore her point. 

Ingo considers this. "You intended to use these," he gestures with the rice ball in his hand, "to confirm whether you were on the correct track?" 

"That makes it sound stupid, Ingo." Akari pouts, and pulls herself up to wander the beach. It had started to rain, ever so slightly. She kicks around in the sand for a moment before making a little noise of delight, grabbing and then holding out an oblong, flat stone to show Ingo. He furrows his brow, puzzled. 

"I guess it was a long shot. Professor Laventon once told me that memory is connected to your senses. Scent, sight, hearing. Taste." Akari turns back towards the waterline and pulls her arm out at a sharp angle, reminding Ingo of his own distinct gestures. She says, "I remember being taught to make rice balls, and I remember my pack being filled with them wrapped in this clear, sticky paper. I remember little notes, but I can't remember the words she wrote. I can't remember my mom's face." She snaps her arm forward and releases the stone. It hits the water and skips once, twice, then five more times farther towards the horizon. In stark contrast to her words, Akari does a little jump and claps her hands, shouting, "Ingo, did you see that? Seven!" 

Ingo aches with a familiarity that is like an old wound. He nods tightly, clears his throat, and assures her that he did, in fact, see.

Their conversation continues over a stone skipping lesson, the beach scoured and the rain entirely ignored except for the bouts of wind that aided or derailed their endeavors. Ingo learns the perfect stones are round and flat, and that despite the sharp angles of the throwing form, his stiffness is no ally here. While Akari demonstrates the technique with prowess, they revisit old conversations about their fragmented memories and respective journeys to Hisui.

They speak of Akari's arrival, imbued with purpose, leading her to lie and play obeisance to ensure her survival, while Ingo's with nothing but his name was both a blessing and curse. 

"At least you had your name," Akari says at one point, voice light. "I had to make up mine on the spot. Just popped in my head."

Not for the first time, Ingo compares the Pearl Clan's aid to the Galaxy Team's welcome. He burns with something nearing rage at the idea that this child was met with the threat of homelessness and hunger, when she had been blessed to arrive in inhabited territory. Ingo understands Cyllene's methods, and the need to ensure that Jubilife is maintained by hard workers, each willing to carry their weight. Starvation and exposure, though, were very real to Ingo after his arrival at the Icelands. Furthermore, something deeper within him balked at the notion of such wanton abandonment, of the idea of there being no place for individuals that don’t meet one leader’s notion of merit. It was not within him to condone such things. 

At another point, Ingo muses, "The Pearl Clan's position on confinement at one point rose to argument, one I recall having in my past life. Perhaps in that world, there are those who believe the same about pokeballs? I wonder if I was as unusual there, as well." 

Eventually they run out of stones, while Ingo has still only mastered two skips. Not one to give up on him, Akari calls on her Samurott and diligently explains the size and dimensions of the stones they need to her partner. Samurott, for his part, waits ever so patiently through Akari's explanation, even though Ingo can see his gaze slide towards the waves periodically during her instructions. 

Samurott returns with more than enough stones in tow. Akari, elated, does not stop him from turning heel back to the ocean to continue his rainy swim, only calling for him to give them a wide berth lest he get caught by an errant stone.

It's when Ingo reaches, miraculously, five skips that Akari says, "Ingo, I think we should go home." 

Ingo almost sulks, feeling deprived of reaching Akari's initial seven-skip victory. They were discussing battle techniques they had arrived to Hisui already knowing, conversation light. Thoroughly soaked, Ingo realizes she's right, admonishes himself for the childish resistance that sprung up unbidden. To indicate agreement, he intends to use his signature pose and phrase, but as he turns inward to add flourish to his point, Akari is looking up at him as if Ingo's next words could ruin her. 

Oh. 

"Oh." 

Sylveon and Samurott flank Akari and mimic her hard stare, and not for the first time Ingo wonders how much Pokemon understand of human speech and idiosyncrasies. After more than an hour of conversation over activity, with no need for prolonged eye contact or proper turn-taking, Ingo feels suddenly cornered by this rain-soaked girl, half his size. He realizes that she may have planned this morning in its entirety, up to this very question. 

Ingo resisted the urge to secure himself more time, to break her stare by scrubbing the water from his face and shielding his eyes. Instead, he says, "Isn't Hisui our home, now? Aren't we needed here?" 

Akari falters, looking her age again, small and sad. "Haven't we done enough?" She asks, and Ingo suspects she speaks more for herself than for him. 

So Ingo nods sharply. "Akari, you have done more than enough. If it's your desire to return to your home station, it is your right, and I will do everything in my power to help you."

Quickly she says, "Then come with me," and Ingo is caught off guard by the surety with which she insists. Resisting the urge to ask why him, of all people, Ingo is at a loss for any other words. Akari continues, "I've really thought about this, Ingo. I really, really believe you're from where I am. Maybe not the same place exactly, but near enough to have met and battled me once."

Ingo doesn’t disagree. It would explain why her presence had triggered his memories, even the barest fragments, after years of nothing but his name. "And what of those here who care about us? Those we have obligations to?" 

Akari dug her hand into Samurott's mane, and Ingo understands that she had considered this, too. "During that shit--" 

"Language, Akari."

"During that shit with Melli in Wayward cave, you said that you were starting to recall a man that looked like you, someone you would battle with, someone who cared about Pokemon like you do. But then, when Volo started asking questions, you mentioned not knowing whether you even had a family. How could you say that? What if the person who you remembered is your family? What if they miss you? Don't you have an obligation to them as well? Even if we can't remember them?"

Ingo shrinks in on himself, resentful of his past self for saying such thoughtless things near another person separated from their former world. Ingo prefers to carefully set aside and compartmentalize his lost past when with strangers. It was easier to simply be Lady Sneasler’s Warden, the strange foreigner with no history adopted by the Pearl Clan. Of course, with Akari he had revealed the longing he had to remember. He should have known better than to cast that aside in front of her. Not when he knew she was the same. 

Akari glowers at him, then continues. "With our friends here, we have the chance to give them closure. For all we know, we just disappeared from our previous lives. My mom made me rice balls with little notes in the container and I just left her, Ingo! And," she stops, and she's starting to cry. Ingo's heart hurts. He needs to comfort her, but he's dead on the tracks. She tries again, "and I'm scared. I don’t want to go alone. Not when I can't remember."

Suddenly he's moving again, pulling her into a hug. Akari is sobbing and apologizing into his chest, her Pokemon and Gliscor hover nervously nearby. The rain stops. 

After time passes, Akari pulls back and looks down at the sand with red-rimmed eyes. "I'm sorry," she says. "I'm being so selfish, aren't I? I started with what I wanted and then yelled at you when you asked pretty fair questions about what I was asking for. In my defense, it's been a long year." 

"It has," Ingo agrees, a reflex. Then he realizes that, for all its tumult, for him it had not been. The first year in Hisui had felt a lifetime, but after normalcy and routine set in, the subsequent three and a half had simply passed him by. Looking at Akari now, he couldn't let that happen to her. Her life had been disrupted enough. 

As for his own? 

Perhaps she was right. Perhaps there was someone waiting for him. 

"Akari," He says, loud and sure. "Please forgive me. I did not intend to send you on such a track. You have done nothing wrong, and I'm glad you've considered me for this new route. Of course I can accompany you. Of course I will."

The days that follow demand much of them both, and they have little opportunity to discuss the specifics of their journey. Rather, Ingo occupies himself with his affairs with the Pearl Clan and the Jubilife Training Grounds, while Akari traverses Hisui to say her goodbyes. 

Quickly realizing the task ahead of them both, Akari and Ingo agree to meet at the Temple of Sinnoh ruins in a week. A fairly foreboding location, however appropriate. 

Ingo begins in Jubilife, informing the local trainers as well as Rei and Professor Laventon, with great care as to allow Akari her own opportunity to discuss the decision. He bears no ill will towards the rest of the Galaxy Team, but his relationship with Commander Kamado is fraught and Captain Cyllene is a woman of few words. He leaves both with a firm handshake and firmer goodbye. 

It is nearing dusk of the first day as he leaves Jubilife Village for the last time, and although Ingo is grateful for the Survey Corps' offer of escort, he knows the route well and prefers to make the trek north alone. 

The Pearl Settlement is far, farther still with Ingo's diversions to see his Pokemon off. Akari informed him of her plan to release her Pokemon, with the exception of Samurott, who she would return to Professor Laventon. Not knowing the path ahead, she was uncertain whether her team would be at ease, or even safe, where they were headed. Though they both knew their Pokemon would follow them to the end of this world and the next, they agreed their teams would stay in Hisui. 

Time is short, and the journey would be easier with his Lady's aid, yet Ingo hadn't the heart to call her. Instead, he traveled with Wyrdeer, relying on his determination and familiarity with the land to guide them.

Alakazam and Tangrowth were first, seen off the second night and third morning, respectively. Ingo was thankful for Alakazam's gentle, knowing nod and the goodbyes she shares with his team, likely conveying the cause of Ingo's departures better than Ingo ever could. Tangrowth stands watch at their makeshift camp in the Crimson Mirelands, and disappears into Gapejaw Bog by daybreak. Ingo presses on. 

They encounter Melli through the Highlands, as anticipated. Their conversation begins clumsily but concludes genuinely, and Melli surprises Ingo with a handshake and an apology for any hard feelings over his past behavior. There were none, which Melli appears shocked to learn. Ingo understands a little more what Akari had meant about closure. 

Upon reaching the windward foothills of Mount Coronet, Ingo's team is down to one. He releases Gliscor from his pokeball, explains himself briefly, then snaps the ball in half at the hinge. Gliscor hisses as if burned, then waits. Ingo pockets the remains of the pokeball, nods, and together they press forward to the Pearl Settlement. It is the night of the fifth day by the time they arrive. 

Irida is beside herself. Initially, she argues. When Ingo is not dissuaded, she asks him question after question about the land he came from. Once clear that they will be worlds apart with no sure way to meet again, she weeps and hugs him fierce and close. He holds her until she is out of tears, hoping she will not mind the few of his own. 

"You will take care, right, Warden Ingo? It was close when we found you, at first. I would rather you be here and alive, instead of home and lost to the cold."

"I will. I will not have Lady Sneasler to guide me, but I trust Akari with our route."

Irida is kind enough to look persuaded, though Ingo knows those memories of his first days in the Pearl Settlement are unlikely to be comforting. "I trust you will take care of her, as well." 

"Her safe arrival at her final destination is my utmost priority." 

"Oh, Ingo," Irida sighs, "You have to prioritize yourself, too. This resolve didn't come out of nowhere, but if it wasn't for Akari, what then? And what happens once you get her home?" 

"I--" Ingo starts, but finds himself without a course to follow. Irida smiles at him and shakes her head, a gesture usually reserved for fond confusion at his many foreign phrases. It serves the same purpose, there need be no additional comments. 

Ingo wonders how often Irida had covered for him, brushing away hard questions with a shake of her head. At times past, Ingo had burned with shame at the habit, feeling pushed aside, a silly man with strange words. Only now, it felt that Irida could convey without needing to speak that, however odd, Ingo was no stranger. His quirks, his differences, were nothing to be concerned with, nor to fear. Ingo hadn't realized until the rifts how tenuous that trust was beyond the Pearl Settlement. Long before, had that trust been built in the Settlement itself with small actions, the choice of acceptance, without him noticing?

Ingo can say nothing more meaningful than his heartfelt thanks. His throat is tight, and he bows his head low to spare himself her intensity and the weight of farewell. "Thank you, Lady Irida. I don't know where this journey will take me, but I know no matter the final destination that I will never forget you." 

Ingo means it. If he has any say in it, he will never forget again. 

Ingo remains in the Pearl Settlement for the sixth day. At dawn of his last day on Hisui, he calls Lady Sneasler with the Celestica Flute and prepares for the worst. 

As with the Pearl Clan, Lady Sneasler would not have been informed of Ingo's departure during Akari's rounds. It was a clumsy solution, perhaps, but neither Akari nor Ingo was willing to break the other's news without their presence. While they could have traveled together these few days, Akari had insisted that Ingo deserved privacy. After pressing, she admitted that she was afraid she would make his departure about herself, and she felt he would let her. 

Ingo did not argue, and now days later his Lady approaches him with a forlorn look that Ingo interpreted as a sign that Akari had informed her of her own departure. 

"My Lady," he inclines his head, to which Lady Sneasler replies with a mild sniff. Gliscor hovers nearby still, and his Lady eyes him before turning back to Ingo with clear incredulity. Ingo's use of pokeballs has been a constant, and he realizes that Lady Sneasler must be able to distinguish between a captured Pokemon, a wild Pokemon, and whatever middle ground that Gliscor now occupies.

Ingo, a fool for having yet again underestimated his Lady's intelligence, clears his throat and starts again. "My Lady, I would like to request your assistance scaling Mount Coronet. Our destination is the Temple of Sinnoh, and we must leave shortly to keep our schedule."

Out of Lady Sneasler's pack pokes out the face of one of her kits. It--no, she--is still mostly feathery down, the darker splotches of purple just coming in. She clambers onto her mother's shoulder, evidently understanding the need to make room in the basket. Meanwhile, his Lady kneels down. Ingo pulls himself into the pack, pausing to pat the little Sneasel in thanks for sacrificing her carrier for his benefit. 

His Lady makes quick work of the trek, relatively speaking. There's still some afternoon waning by the point Ingo feels that they're suitably proximate. Ingo asks Lady Sneasler if he may briefly alight, as he has another request of her. 

Cloudcap Pass is frigid and still, and Ingo’s first task is to scoop up the little Sneasel and bundle her in his coat, by way of apology for what must have been an unpleasant journey for someone so young. His Lady pays him little mind, used to his interactions with her kits. Her attention is on Gliscor, the two of them chattering animatedly. Ingo realizes he has run out of time. 

"My Lady," he interrupts, and Lady Sneasler swings her gaze his way with a withering look. Ingo, in turn, withers. 

"I see. I believe Gliscor has informed you of my true destination this evening?"

Lady Sneasler nods, and flails her arm loosely towards Gliscor, conveying easily her opinion of that conversation. She then stalks up to Ingo, and, though not an Alpha, at her full height she leers over Ingo's well-settled slouch. He attempts to straighten his back, rolling his shoulders to their appropriate position, ignoring the way they pop into place. 

Eye to eye, Ingo and Lady Sneasler try to communicate their respective positions across language and species. Ingo thinks she understands, truly, but he nonetheless expected the resistance. She hadn't the means that Irida did to demand he stay, only her presence and four years of partnership. 

"My Lady, I know you have heard of Akari's departure. I intend to see to it that she reaches her station, and in doing so return to the world I belong to."

Her responding snort suggests what she must think of where Ingo belongs. He continues, "I cannot thank you enough for all you have done for me. I would not have survived a week in Hisui had you not come to my aid, nor would I be where I am today had you not accepted me as your Warden.

"When I had nothing in Hisui, I had your trust and care. If I may be selfish, as we humans tend to be, and ask one last thing of you, it would be to please continue to protect the Pearl Clan, as I know you will. And to know that I may no longer be your warden, but I will always be your friend."

Lady Sneasler silently blinked at him, and for a moment Ingo fears he has failed to get through to her. It is only when her kit peeks out from his jacket to reach out for her mother that the Lady gave way. With a wounded keen, she leans her head on his shoulder and delicately wraps her long arms around his head in what Ingo understands to be a strange hug. The little Sneasel struggles in Ingo's arms, mimicking her mother with a high-pitched wail. 

It is not enough to turn him back, but it is close, the grief of this Pokemon to which he owes his life. 

It strikes Ingo how lucky he has been, all things considered, to be so cared for.

He wonders whether anyone in the world before Hisui had grieved him so. Would he arrive at this place and find himself unneeded, having left behind a home where he may not have originally belonged to but that had welcomed him? A place that had wanted him? 

The Sneasel frees herself from Ingo's grasp and crawls to her mother's shoulders. Failing to secure her attention, she scrambles up Lady Sneasler's arms and settles on Ingo's tattered hat. Either this or Ingo's resulting chuckle succeeds at drawing the Lady from her reverie. She pulls back and looks at her kit with the tired eyes Ingo thought unique to human parents, before leveling him with the same look. Ingo, fond, sighs.  

"If you would like, Lady Sneasler, you and your child may accompany Gliscor and myself to the summit. I will not ask you to carry me, but we may walk. Together."

Lady Sneasler agrees. 

Akari waits patiently as Ingo formally releases Gliscor at the threshold of the Temple of Sinnoh. Lady Sneasler stands in the snow a ways off. Ingo suspects she will be there until he is truly gone, whatever that entails. 

Gliscor's departure pains him, but it does not drag on. The Pokemon understands, leans his cold forehead against Ingo's, and takes off. Ingo feels something heavy and final settle in his chest, like the stones he and Akari skipped at Prelude Beach, sinking beneath the waves. 

The midday sun bounces off the white stone stairs and the nearby snowdrift, blinding Ingo as he ascends. In the ruins atop the stairs, it's almost warm under the direct light. Ingo does not take off his coat. 

At the far end of the ruined temple, Akari sits cross-legged on a raised plinth, watching him approach. "Crazy, isn't it?" She says, sweeping a hand over the shattered pillars around him. "Months ago, this was an old building, but in one piece, you know? Now it looks like ancient history, save the blue paint."

Ingo hums, aiming for agreement but hitting closer to acknowledgement. Akari doesn't press. Rather, with a hum in return, she throws her hands on her knees and pushes herself to her feet. 

"Guess we should get on with it, huh?" 

Surer now, Ingo nods sharply. "Yes. All Aboard!" 

The phrase earns a chuckle from Akari, who nods back and then pulls out an unfamiliar object from her pack. It resembles a seashell, or maybe a sea urchin, blue and hollow-spined. Akari brings the object to her mouth and plays first the whistling notes of the Celestica Flute, before segueing into a descending melody Ingo almost recognizes, but can not place. It's at the final chord, a lifting high note that resolves the discordance, that Ingo recalls the hymns sung at Festivals in the Pearl Settlement that Irida had tried in vain to teach him. 

Between blinks, a staircase of light appears at the far end of the plinth, climbing upwards to the horizon. Ingo startles, and Akari looks at him sheepishly. "I'm sorry. It's all very dramatic, right?" She says as an explanation, and begins up the stairs. With no alternative, Ingo follows.

The view of Hisui from Mount Coronet is something in of itself, but it does not compare to what Ingo witnesses from the staircase in the sky. The land lies vast beneath him, light in the evening glow, and he can see every moment of the past four and a half years stretched out before him. Good and bad, defeat and victory, for better and worse, each moment was here, and because of and in spite of it all, he had lived. 

If this will to be his last view of Hisui, Ingo thanks whomever had granted it to him. 

After some time, though not nearly long enough for the sun to set, it is night. It's as if Ingo can see every star in the sky, but the way before him is lit as if still set in broad daylight. Between them and the starry expanse, an aurora undulates in a circular shape, giving the impression of a platform at the end of the stairway. 

The aches from the climb up Coronet and the week prior of travel have faded. Ingo feels almost weightless, unaged, and the distance still to their destination grows less daunting. 

He and Akari do not speak during the climb. At one point, Ingo attempts to ask a question, but finds his own voice drowned out by the rush of blood in his ears, loud as the rush of wind as a train barrels past a platform. 

Ingo thinks about Akari on this track alone, determined to return home. He thinks of her already having traveled it once before, in order to know it's here. He thinks about all the things he doesn't understand about what happened since she fell from the rift, and how little he understands about how he arrived to Hisui himself. The scale of this moment dwarfs Ingo with his own ignorance, and he struggles to reconcile the girl who begged him not to be left to face her own homeland by herself with the one who strides confidently ahead into the unknown. 

He thinks about her memory of their battle in a past life. What had Ingo thought of her then? Who had they been? Why had they been brought together by the wills of space and time with no knowledge of who they were, had they met before? 

Akari waits on the final stair. "We should step up together." She has to yell to be heard. 

When they alight onto the platform, the stairs beneath them vanish as quickly as they appeared. The aurora sinks like fog beneath them. They press forward, towards the center of this platform of almost-glass that doesn't ring out with their footsteps, nor respond with any physical give to suggest they’ve stepped on a surface at all. Across the floor are designs of circles, reminding Ingo of planetary orbits or elemental diagrams. From where he learned of either of those concepts, he cannot recall. 

It is silent save for the throbbing echo of blood pumping in Ingo's head. They are alone. Akari, ever irreverent, rolls her eyes. She holds her pointer and middle fingers upside down and motions with them, like two little legs, in a tight circle. Not one to question, Ingo turns around. 

The air pressure around them pops like a fresh bottle of sake and Ingo feels his blood pressure plummet in turn. He can hear again, and Akari is saying his name and to turn around, but Ingo is unsure if his legs will respond to the instructions. 

Another voice replies, not Ingo's, crystal clear as if speaking directly into his ear. "Fear not, thou shall soon find your bearings."

Ingo recalls someone who always had a snide comeback prepared. It was not him. Ingo waits for the bearings he has been promised. 

When he feels able to move again, Ingo turns around to face a Pokemon unlike anything he's ever seen, almost equine or ungulate but for the metallic face and the familiar symbol haloing its midsection. Akari introduces it as Arceus. Ingo takes this in stride. 

Arceus speaks again, voice too close to register as sound and instead feels like thought. "Thou hath come to return from whence you came."

"Yes," Akari replies, firm and clear. 

"Dost thou know for what thy asks?" 

"Yes," Akari says again. Ingo wonders if it's not best to ask for clarification when such an entity asks such vague and leading questions. 

"That which awaits thee is not what thy left behind." 

Ingo watches Akari's expression shift from resolute to alarmed. "What--What do you mean?" Arceus hovers benignant before them, Ingo searching its features for an expression or some other indication of what it is suggesting. 

"The chosen, thee, were needed. Yet the harm caused thus was not the intent. To remove this consequence, the Lake Spirits of Sinnoh were called upon to ensure that the absence of the chosen was unproblematic." 

Struggling to follow Arceus's turn of phrase, Ingo watches Akari as it speaks, growing horrified as the color drains from her face and she stares, speechless. 

"All is not lost," Arceus insists. 

Akari laughs, reedy and wild. Her wide eyes meet Ingo's and her mouth snaps shut, pressed into a thin line. Ingo’s stomach turns. 

Ingo cannot leave her to face this alone. "What do we do?" he asks, maintaining eye contact with Akari but speaking loud, confident, so that Arceus knows to answer. 

"Find thy Pokemon, whose bonds with thee have not been severed. Seek out Azelf, Mesprit, and Uxie. Only the Lake Spirits of Sinnoh can restore that which has been lost." 

"And what about Ingo and me? Our memories?" Akari asks, holding eye contact with Ingo in turn. 

"Thy memories were not intentionally taken, and shall return with time once returned to thine origins." 

Akari closes her eyes, folds in on herself, and takes several slow, rattling breaths. Ingo recalls knowing the steps to aiding someone through a panic attack, but cannot remember what they were. The memory’s emergence is worse now with all he's just learned. Ingo sits with it, holding the pain close to his chest and observes it as if its tendrils were not latched onto his own heart. 

Once Akari's breathing is no longer audible, Ingo returns his gaze to her and asks, "Okay?" 

"Okay," She replies, not missing a beat. 

A low rumble emits from Arceus, the first sound that's bodily, rather than transmitted directly into Ingo's head. It folds its forelegs into a bow, one that reads not of reverence but of gratitude. It lowers its head to the ground and the not-glass platform dissipates beneath them, leaving only the glow of the concentric circular patterns and the soft chill of the aurora as they phase through it, falling, falling, falling towards nothing below. 

The last thing Ingo hears is Arceus's voice in his head once more, saying, "Should thou wish to return to Hisui, I will await thee at the Hall of Origin. Beware, time is not kind to indecisiveness. If Hisui is what thee seek, do not tarry.” 

Chapter Text

Emmet, exhausted, contributes to the applause as best he can manage as Skyla shepherds out her co-pilot, a Mistralton gym trainer turned apprentice with dreams of flying commercial airlines. The boy flushes cherry red and Emmet remembers the practical final at the end of his master's degree. Though not without a hitch, when the train came to a smooth stop at the end of the platform, Emmet had picked up his secondman by the waist and swung him in delighted circles until they collapsed on the plastic cab flooring, dizzy with glee. They received matching uniforms that evening.

As Sinnoh's primary airport west of Mount Coronet, JCA is fairly large. The staff accommodates their arrival without issue, but charter planes do not get priority at the gates and so now they stand on the tarmac waiting for a bus to transport them to the airport proper. Pokemon are not allowed on the runway, a reasonable safety consideration despite Iris's complaints. As they wait, Emmet longs for his coat and tries not to shiver, trying harder still not to scold Elesa or Iris for not mentioning that it would be winter in Sinnoh. 

Iris would lecture him on equators and planetary hemispheres, and mock him for his scope of geographic knowledge that begins and ends with Nimbasa City. Elesa simply didn't need more to worry about. Seated next to him on the flight, she stirred at regular intervals to find him awake, staring out the window, bouncing his leg or popping his finger joints. Though she never pressured him to try and sleep, she eventually settled her headphones over his ears and pressed her Xtransceiver into his hand, complete with a library of 3,572 saved songs. After three hours he found an album that, on repeat, carried him through the remainder of the flight. 

So, it's winter in Sinnoh and Emmet is fine. Once the bus breaks the horizon, Emmet prods at his own Xtransceiver, checking his emails as a distraction now that the wait has a defined endpoint. Someone had set up automatic replies and much of his work was likely being rerouted to his subordinates, but any email he’s copied on still reaches him. It's just as well to keep up with ongoings at the station without being the intended recipient. A fair bit of snooping aside, he's halfway through tracking a cab repair on the Green Line, directing next steps on a Pokemon-related incident on Gear Station Platform 2, and planning upgrades on the wiring for the lighting on the trucks when Elesa slaps his hand and fixes him with a stern look. 

"I'll have Emolga short-circuit that thing, mark my words." 

Emmet is never too tired to argue and smirks. "Do you remember the last time we traveled together? I seem to recall my GPS being very important."

Elesa wrinkles her nose at the memory, muttering something about having a map too, and snatches her headphones back from around Emmet's neck. The bus rumbles to a stop in front of the boarding stairs, the doors sliding open with a sharp pneumatic hiss. The three of them, sans the pilots, pile into the vehicle. 

Once seated, Emmet leans his forehead against the window glass and watches the runway roll by. Clusters of ground crew personnel hustle about in service of aircraft and the various local and visiting airlines. He can approximate their activities, from fuelling vehicles to loading cargo and de-icing exteriors to directing freight between supply gates. Emmet would otherwise bristle at the suggestion of similarity between their work and his own, but the familiarity of procedure and routine is a comfort that he appreciates at this moment. 

From across the bus, Iris breaks the weary silence. "Heya, Emmet," she says brightly. "You doing okay over there? We've barely talked!"

Emmet presses his head firmer against the window, the solid of cold glass relief for the growing pressure at his temples, and counts to three. Then he straightens his posture and levels Iris with a smile, not too sharp. "I am fine. I did not sleep on the plane like you did, but there's coffee at the airport. Nothing to worry about!" 

"Oh, okay!" Iris replies. "Yeah, I think coffee is a good idea. We have a bit of a trek after the airport to get to the wind place."

"Valley Windworks," Elesa supplies, then yawns. "You sure we shouldn't book a hotel in Jubilife first, maybe freshen up or, oh, I don't know, sleep?" 

Emmet jolts, and quickly shakes his head. "I would rather see what my uncle has to show me. He and Iris chartered a plane to get us here." He would also prefer to not prolong this trip, of course, and Emmet knows that Elesa knows but the half-lie is still easier. 

"Emmet, you're dead on your feet." The bus pulls into the gate and the intercom bell rings, announcing their arrival. Elesa does not move. "You haven't slept. Last time you did sleep, it didn't go great."

His smile falters as Iris makes an inquisitive sound behind them. Emmet stands up, pulls his back straighter, and lugs his bag onto his shoulder. He glances from Elesa to the door, waiting for her to follow. 

She does not move. 

Apart from the slight slip of his expression, Emmet does not show his frustration. Not just as a matter of pride, but because Elesa isn't wrong. Emmet wants nothing more than a warm bed and seven to ten hours of sleep. But not at the cost of extending his time in Sinnoh more than necessary. The itinerary is clear, the destination set. The schedule cannot accommodate detours. 

If he can just stay in motion, he can prove to Elesa and Iris and Uncle Drayden that he is fine. All Emmet needs to do is to visit with his uncle, evaluate the wind technology to fulfill the conceit of this trip, and then he can go back to Nimbasa. If Elesa wants to keep a closer eye on him there, fine. Emmet never minds her company. In Nimbasa, though, he can work and battle, and he won't need to stop or think. He'll be better off. 

Finally, Elesa stands and pulls her bag close to her chest. With a last, long look his way, she steps out of the bus and towards the airport gate.  

---

The cold air in the craggy foothills where they land is gentler than the biting chill of Mount Coronet's peak, but Ingo stirs to find Akari hugging her knees tight and trembling. He does not know how long he has been in a daze, though he finds his head throbbing and his chest rattling with every inhale. He is laying flat on his back, on ruddy earth cushioned by sparse patches of short, damp grass.  

His name is Ingo. 

He traveled here from Hisui, but he is not from there. 

There, he was the Lady Sneasler's Warden, and a member of the Pearl Clan. 

He taught new trainers, fearful still of Pokemon but eager to understand the bond they could share, how to battle and form partnerships. 

The girl beside him is Akari, the hero of Hisui and chosen of Arceus. She traveled with him from Hisui, but she was not from there. 

Ingo is bringing her home. 

Home does not remember her. 

Home does not remember him. 

Akari sniffles and says, "You alright, Ingo?" 

I have been better. "I am fine." 

He flexes his hand, folding each finger inward one at a time. He begins once more. 

His name is Ingo. He traveled here from--

Akari sniffles again. Her cheek is pressed up against her knees, facing away from him. "Ingo, you remember me, right?" Her voice is so small that he almost doesn't hear her. His headache redoubles with the strain of listening close, but then the words resolve. 

Ingo surges up, ignoring the spots of dark in his vision that follow. "Akari, of course I do," he assures her. "I’ve forgotten nothing. Or, rather, nothing more than I already had prior to our departure." 

She crumbles with the force of the fear she must have been holding onto. "Okay," Akari says with a breathy laugh, lifting her head. "Okay. Good. Me, too." Her voice is soft and choked, and Ingo wonders if Arceus knows the difference between a human adult and child. Did it rip a child away from her home and family on purpose, then steal their memories of her? Or did it simply not understand? 

Ingo drags himself to his feet and holds out a hand to pull Akari to hers. Her smile doesn't reach her red-rimmed eyes, but he appreciates the effort. He hoists her up and together they turn to survey their surroundings. 

To Ingo, the land before him is both familiar and not. The jutting rust-toned hills they arrived upon overlook a forest that bows around viridian pastures, flower fields in bloom despite the chill, and a meandering river that pours down from the mountains behind them. Hisui is here, in the sweep of the land and the curve of the river, but new routes carve different paths than those of his memory and on the horizon climbs great towers of spinning blades that are like nothing Ingo has ever seen. 

It must be mid-afternoon, judging by the way the sun hangs amidst its westward arc. Ingo is glad for the fair skies, although morning would be preferable to secure them time to reach the nearest town before nightfall. The closest signs of human life are the spinning towers to the north. Ingo points outward towards them, and says, "I suggest our initial destination should be those towers. In the absence of our Pokemon, we should seek safety with others as priority." 

Akari dips her head, thoughtful. "Arceus said that our Pokemon will remember us. If we find people, maybe we can find where we are and then we can figure out where our Pokemon might be. If they're like who they were in Hisui, Azelf, Mesprit and Uxie will need us to have a team."

That's news. Intrigued, Ingo says, "Oh? Have you encountered these Pokemon before?" 

In what Ingo recognizes as a ploy to not look at him, Akari starts down the hill. He follows after her, stride long to keep pace. "Yeah," she says, low but loud enough that Ingo can still hear. "When I was exiled, I faced trials at their lakes. It was a whole thing, reforging the red chain that can bind Sinnoh. It worked, for what it’s worth."

“I see,” Ingo says. Akari's stopped, but he keeps onward. 

"I'm sorry, Ingo. If I knew--If I could have gone back--" 

Setting aside the ghost of cold, of hunger, of what it was like to wait without knowing if and when and how, Ingo closes his eyes and says, "There's no need, Akari. You did nothing wrong." Before she could argue, he steers the conversation back onto its original track. "That you've met these Pokemon, even in their past, is an excellent advantage. I'm sure--" 

Akari cuts in. "Ingo."

He is not prepared to have this conversation. He raises his voice, aware of how rude he's being, but Akari is repeating herself, louder still. "No, Ingo, not that. Your, uh, your jacket's moving."

That it was. 

Startled, Ingo shrugs out of the tattered sleeves and in a smooth motion folds the jacket lengthwise over his arm. His left pocket wobbles in protest. He quickly calculates which Pokemon would be small enough to fit in his pockets, their typings and aggression levels. Ingo could only hope this land has similar Pokemon to Hisui. It's no help that the pockets are fairly large, patched and expanded over the years to fit pokeballs and medicines. The list grows. 

The Pokemon reveals itself nose first, nestled in feathery down, lilac, with deeper purple fur just starting to come in. Wide red eyes peer up at him, blink, and Sneasel coos in time with the breath that catches in his throat. 

"Akari," He starts, voice strained as he uses his free hand to scoop up the kit. "It appears I have inadvertently kidnapped one of Lady Sneasler's children."

Akari, ever resilient, begins to laugh. 

The coffee helps. As does a fair compromise, hotel rooms on the northeastern edge of Jubilife city booked, showers enjoyed, and lunch ordered by room service as Iris's (meaning also Uncle Drayden's) treat. 

Some hours later, they are on Route 205 by way of a beautiful, if quaint, town called Floaroma and Chandelure will not stay in her pokeball.

Iris teases Emmet incessantly. On the one hand, he appreciates that she has not allowed his less-than-convincing displays of composure to change how she treats him. On the other, this is completely out of character for Chandelure and insisting on that is not helping his case as a trainer nor a competent, functioning adult. 

Elesa eyes the skyline. "I'm actually worried about her still wandering around once the sun sets. Sinnoh doesn't have Chandelures, right? She'll freak out some kid and we'll never hear the end of it."

Iris laughs. "I can see the headlines now. Unova Subway Master lets loose frightening ghost Pokemon in sleepy Sinnoan countryside; allows it to burn up and consume local children's souls. More at 11:00."

With a groan, Emmet calls for Chandelure again. On command, she phases through the treeline, blinks into Emmet's personal space, trills, and then vanishes again. "What the fuck, Chandelure," he whines, considering whether it would makes things better or worse to send another one of his team after her. All of his Pokemon are Unovan native, and Elesa and Iris have him on edge about them getting lost in an unfamiliar region. 

"This is why we only carry six Pokemon," Iris says, and Emmet wants to slam his head into the nearest tree because he doesn't need a preview of his uncle right now. "You ever think that ten is, like, a lot?" 

"They are my partners," he replies, and then, "Chandelure, please!"

This time, Chandelure doesn't reappear. Emmet swears again. Elesa and Iris are discussing the merits of teams of four or six Pokemon. To the northeast, staggered lines of wind turbines dot the horizon, titanic and white, their sheer scale finally apparent as the group is within a half hour of their destination. 

In the distance, Chandelure’s trill is like bellsong. 

Haxorus's pokeball itches at his hip. He’s out of options. 

Emmet tears off southward, breaking into the bramble with his forearms crossed over his face. It's like running to catch a train, leaping over the turnstiles in a rush, laughing as safety is secondary to schedules just this once because the new battle service is opening for the first time and he can't wait to face their first challenger, together. 

Unexpectedly for woodland off a subdued rural route, the tall pines grow thick, towering as they intertwine near their peaks to cut off the dwindling evening light. The rush of the river that ran north of the route to Valley Windworks fades, as do Iris's and Elesa's yells after him. Emmet catches a glimpse of purple-blue and allows them to lure him forward, calling out for Chandelure to please just stay put. 

In the distance, her fire dances and sways but she does not move. Emmet readies her pokeball, cold in his hand. 

As Emmet nears, Chandelure's flames reveal figures before her, huddled together. Lamplight reflects off the dark clothes of the larger figure, back twisted and head ducked so that his shoulder and an arm are thrust out around the smaller of the two, seemingly a child. A small Pokemon, a Sneasel cast purple in Chandelure's glow, stands on the larger figure’s shoulder, hissing. 

Emmet swears under his breath and cobbles together a script, frantically pressing the recall on Chandelure's pokeball. 

"I am very sorry. Chandelure means no harm. She is just a curious Pokemon. She must have sensed you in the woods and thought it best to conduct you home before night time. I sincerely apologize for my Pokemon's behavior." 

Why wouldn't Chandelure return? The pokeball’s red light casts over her, then sputters out each attempt. Why were these strange people alone in the woods without a Pokemon to defend them, and where had they come from?

Chandelure continues to trill, turning between Emmet to these strangers in tight pirouettes. Seeing that she would not return, and that these people were evidently frightened, Emmet inserts himself in front of his Pokemon. He responds to Chandelure’s disappointed noise by sending his arm out beside him, a silent, stern command for her to stay still. "Once again, I am very sorry. Can I escort you and your Pokemon to safety?" 

The larger figure looks out from under the rim of his hat, eyes hard and tired and--

And…

His own? 

Emmet stumbles back, bumping into Chandelure. Her trills grow hurried, like chatter. Emmet jerks his head, blinking rapidly in the hope that his vision adjusts to the low light. Those eyes stare back at him, unchanged except for pupils that recede to pinpricks despite the darkness. 

"Oh. It must be the sleep deprivation," Emmet says, more to himself. "I'm seeing double."

The figure lifts his head and reveals a man wearing Emmet's face. Moreso, he wears Emmet's uniform, except it is black and has clearly seen better days. 

Emmet considers a Zoroark finding their way to Sinnoh, lost with their cub. Except Emmet isn't wearing his uniform. Elesa insisted that he left it at home.  Moreso, that wouldn't explain Chandelure's behavior. Though she may be less expressive than his other Pokemon, Emmet can read her well. Chandelure is happy, and she led Emmet here, to this man that looks exactly like him.

Emmet's head pulses with sudden, intense pain, his vision blurring at the edges. He realizes his face has flushed fever-hot, so he grabs onto one of Chandelure's arms and lowers himself to the dirt. 

The man has pulled himself away from the other figure, a girl who is looking from Emmet to the man with wide eyes and a breathless half-smile. Good, Emmet is glad someone is enjoying themselves. 

"Are you alright?" the man asks in a voice that Emmet, for some reason, thinks is too quiet. 

Another wave of pain rolls in, and Emmet can hear his heartbeat behind his eardrums. He digs his fingers in the leaf litter and wishes he was home. Instead, he's halfway between a panic attack and dying, with no telling which way it’s going to go. He realizes, distantly, that not responding is not helpful, but every time Emmet tries to open his mouth he chokes. The man looks at him with a stern frown, but to Emmet the expression looks so, so sad, and Emmet doesn't understand why. 

Does this man live in Sinnoh? 

Why does he look exactly like Emmet? Not just alike, but identical, save for a beard? 

Where did he get that uniform? 

The girl and the man are talking now, but Emmet can't make out their conversation. 

Emmet's vision swims and he pitches forward to shove his head between his knees. He starts to count, frightened when it doesn't ground him. Even when he can't make out the words, every time he hears this man speak he feels it like an icepick to the skull. He's so tired, too tired for this, and he just wants to be home. 

Wearily, he drags up his head to make pained eye contact with the man with his face. "Hey," he chokes out, all out of scripts and unable to smile. "What's your name?" 

Too soft, again, the man replies, "Ingo." 

And that was it. 

Ingo folds his jacket in on itself thrice and lays it underneath the sleeping man's head. The little Sneasel curls up next to the man's head, purring. No more than a minute had passed, but fainting for longer than a few seconds is never a good sign. It was already clear that the man was unwell, and Ingo had been too absorbed in his own concerns to intervene before it had come to this. 

Unacceptable. 

"For what it's worth, I think that could have gone worse," Akari says as she investigates the strange Pokemon that had cornered them moments before. 

Ingo doesn't answer. He doesn't know where to start. Ages ago, when he had mentioned that he recalled a man that looked like him, Ingo hadn't imagined exactly like him. Then, the memory had been a reflection in a murky pond, and he saw only eyes like his own, a sharp smile, and sharper words. This man had seemed a ghost of that person, obviously worn down even before Ingo's appearance sent him spiraling. Still, it must be him: the man from his memories.

Akari continues beside him. "I mean it! I know that this," she gestures to the man, "is less than ideal, but don't you think that this Pokemon could be the partner you talked about? Mastery of flames and everything!" 

The odd Pokemon sounds her cry, a song like bells that ricochets throughout the clearing. It bobs in the air, in apparent agreement with Akari, and Ingo realizes that he will have to exercise trust and faith. All considered, Ingo was no stranger to either. 

Not leaving the man or Sneasel's side, Ingo shifts slightly so he can look properly at the Pokemon. "Yes, I suspect so. I apologize for my behavior earlier, but I did not initially recognize you. Your name is," he pauses, recalling how the man had pronounced the name before. "Chandelure, correct?" 

The Pokemon, Chandelure, bursts with flames so bright that Ingo is briefly afraid that she will burn Akari. But there's no heat, the flame only a ghost of warmth, and instead she showers their clearing in misty purple light. Embers break from the Pokemon's candle-flames and float, iridescent and weightless, reflecting off motes in the air so that they resemble falling snow caught in a still image. It is no longer cold, the breeze that rattles the pines unable to reach them. They are suspended in the pause between the forest’s own breath, and Ingo can't draw his eyes away. 

"Ingo, your partner is so cool," Akari says reverently. Ingo can't find his voice, but he agrees. 

As the moment ends, voices in the distance carry towards them on the wind. "Chandelure," one voice calls. 

Another, louder and frantic, yells, "Emmet!" 

Emmet. 

Of course. 

His name is Emmet. Ingo looks back to the man on the ground and can't believe that he could ever forget. 

"Emmet," he whispers, hoarse, not intending to speak but unable to stop himself. 

"Ingo? You okay?" 

Akari is kneeling next to him now, facing the direction of the voices with her brow tense. Chandelure hovers over them, slightly askew, as if tilting its head. Ingo takes a shaky inhale to settle his heart and says, "This is Emmet, my twin brother."

While Akari blinks at him, stunned, two people burst into the clearing, still shouting for Chandelure and Emmet. It takes one, a young woman with long black hair, mere seconds to assess the scene and act. A beam of red light blinds Ingo, and suddenly he's being crowded out of his brother's space by a large, equine Pokemon crackling with blue electricity. 

His brain supplies that this is a Zebstrika. It stands tall over Emmet and brays, sending Ingo scrambling back on his hands and feet. He doesn't move far on his own before the woman hauls him up by the collar of his tunic. She's not so strong that she can drag him unwillingly, but her presence is enough to have him backpedaling as she strides forward with him in tow. It seems she only gets a good look at his face when she slams him into the trunk of a tree, because her eyes blow wide when they meet his own. She recovers her composure quickly. 

"What did you do?" She asks, low and dangerous. Ingo notices that Sneasel has clambered onto his shoulder and is trying to threaten her on his behalf, but she pays no mind. The woman flings her free hand, the one not grasping his shirt, at his chest, demanding his attention. "Answer me. Now.”

Where could he even start? 

Ingo swallows hard, mouth dry, and tries to explain. "My appearance proved overwhelming and he derailed. I have confirmed he's breathing and his heart rate is adequate, but for his safety I suggest we conduct him to the nearest medical center without delay."

"Shut up." The woman's voice drips with contempt. She rearranges her hands so that her right forearm is against his chest and elbow digs into his collarbone, pressing him into the tree. Satisfied that he's pinned, she turns her head and says, "This isn't a Zoroark, is it?" 

Akari confirms he is not. "Cool," the woman says, releasing none of the pressure at Ingo's chest and thereby conveying that things were very much not cool. "Then you’re the adult here. You’re responsible. What happened ?”

Ingo's breath hitches, coming in shallow and fast. All he has is a name to cling to, the barest idea of a brother, but Ingo knows with every fiber of his person that he would never, never harm Emmet. "Please," he rasps. "I did not hurt him. He came for Chandelure, who appears to have taken an interest in myself and Akari. Our similarities startled him, exacerbated, I think, by the sleep deprivation that he mentioned. We had little chance to speak before he blacked out. I want to help him. Please."

Her eyes dart between his, searching, as if there was something she could read behind them to discern the truth. Nigh imperceptibly, she softens. "You look so much like him," she says, and then pulls back. “Fine. If you want to help, then stay back. You’ve done enough.” 

Turning sharp on her heel, she leaves him there, discarded. Sneasel climbs from his shoulder onto his hat, bending forward and peering down at him with wide, apologetic eyes, as if Ingo had expected her to protect him and not vice versa. 

Across the clearing, Akari, Chandelure, and the girl he does not recognize wait by Emmet. Akari is pale, but as the woman stalks back in their direction, she does not lower her glare. Ingo stays by the tree, leaning his head back against the rough bark and wondering why this had to be so hard. This was the second time he's been an outsider with no memories, and he almost wishes for the Alabaster Icelands again, however unforgiving the cold.  

Except, he has been in this world for mere hours and found his brother, despite all odds. In all likelihood, Chandelure, too, is family. Perhaps the girl, or even this fierce woman, could have once been dear to him. Ingo cannot hold against her the instinct to protect Emmet. Would he have done the same once, were their positions reversed? The answer arrives easily. In his own way, absolutely. Without reservation. 

"Hey. You. Where'd you get this?" The woman is holding his jacket, arm stretched out long to prevent Akari from snatching it back, while her other hand cradles Emmet's head in her lap. 

Ingo pushes himself off the tree and relies on the inertia to carry him to the group. "It is mine," he replies, flattening his hand towards hers in request. 

"Fuck no it's not." She tosses it, instead, over her shoulder, and shifts onto her hip to start the process of moving Emmet. Her Zebstrika is bowed on folded legs beside them, electricity settled and otherwise docile, but not letting Ingo out of his sight. 

"I must insist. This jacket and my hat were my only effects when I arrived at my previous station. It's extremely important to me."

"Shut the--" she bites out, then stops herself. With a heavy sigh, she tries again. "Let me drape it over him while we get out of here. He’s not dressed for the cold. After we get him safe, we can talk about the Government property." 

She begins to hoist Emmet onto the Zebstrika, and Ingo must make a sound of distress because she's leveling him with another look of disdain. 

"Let me carry him," Ingo insists, finding his courage more easily than anticipated. "We will travel faster if not stopping to ensure he is secure on a Zebstrika not outfitted for passengers."

He's right. Emmet had not yet stirred and night approaches. While this woman may trust Zebstrika far more than Ingo, she had already decided to trust him enough. After all, he was still here, as was Akari, and they were close enough to lend their aid. It was the right, safer, choice to let Ingo carry him.  

Silence hangs still in the air as neither Ingo nor the woman are willing to back down. In his peripheral vision, Ingo sees Akari and the girl make anxious faces at each other, apparently fast friends. Ingo doesn't want to plead again, but he is more than willing if it means that he will secure his brother's safety. 

But the woman gives. "Okay," she says, and Ingo struggles to ignore how the defeat in her voice feels in his chest. "Okay. Fine. You're right. Just, be careful. Please." 

Ingo nods, and aims for reassurance with a salute and a too loud "Safe driving!" For the first time, then, her expression truly shifts. Slowly and then all at once, her stern glare collapses and she's laughing, almost gasping, breathless and a little desperate. As he kneels next to her to pick up his brother, he sees tears prick at the corner of her eyes. 

When she's recovered just enough to look at him again, she asks, "Who are you?" and it sounds like a why more than a who. 

"Ingo." 

She sounds out the name silently as he lifts Emmet's back up from the dirt. The woman supports Emmet’s head and together they pull him to a seated position, keeping him from falling back down as Ingo turns around. One arm after the other, they wrap Emmet around Ingo's back, and on the count of three he stands, knees cracking. With a little bounce, Ingo slips his hands underneath Emmet's knees and says, to punctuate their success, "There. All aboard!"

Emmet's head lolls onto his shoulder and Ingo wonders if he ever carried him like this before, when sick or injured or drunk. The woman seems to read his mind and says, "I have to admit, this is easier than all the times I've had to haul him home." She rests Ingo's coat over Emmet's shoulders, tucking the collar in between his arms and Ingo's back. 

She takes a step back and surveys their team and Ingo imagines what they must look like. Identical strangers, two young girls that have somehow already bonded across their different worlds, a Chandelure far too attached to a man she just met, and, well, herself. 

Ingo must give himself away once again, because she says, "Yeah, we haven't done introductions really, have we? Can we walk and talk?" 

They press on. 

Emmet throws his fists against the wall of his dream and screams himself hoarse, or as near to it as he can get while trapped in sleep. 

It's almost cruel, the way that dream-Ingo, four years, five months and 19 days too young, waits for him on the periphery of memory. He watches placidly, silent after Emmet tells him for the first time in those four years that he is not his brother. Like everything else in Emmet's head, he is a dream, a memory, a series of firing neurons that do nothing but revel in the undead grief that festers within him night after night after night. 

Meanwhile, Ingo, actual Ingo, had been there and all Emmet had to say for it were some empty formalities. Was the best that he could offer his brain running off the rails, aground miles before the station? Chandelure had known Ingo immediately and without reservation. Emmet, by comparison, hadn't managed more than a handful of words, and none of them anything of value. 

His fists ache, like the way his right hand had throbbed after he had punched that detective. This feels like victory because Ingo isn't dead. 

Emmet just doesn’t remember him. 

He allows himself one last frustrated howl and slides down the white space wall and holds his head in his hands. He watches Ingo's boots through the gaps in his fingers as they approach and allows himself to feel thankful as the edges of the familiar scene that Ingo leaves behind fade away.

Ingo sits in front of him. Emmet says, "I hate dreams." 

"I know." 

Whether because this Ingo is Emmet's subconscious or because he has Ingo's memories of long nights awake to stave off nightmares, Emmet can't say. 

"I want to remember you when I wake up."

He lays back, the wall behind him giving way to his wishes so that he can stare up at the ceiling expanse. Ingo says nothing, so Emmet continues. "I don't understand why this is happening. Where did you go?" 

"I'm sorry. I don't know."

Above them, the endless white expanse melts into the golds and grays of Gear Station. Morning light spills in from the atrium windows. Dim, almost translucent, copies of Ingo and Emmet scan in at the turnstile, side by side. 

Emmet knows where this goes. He rolls on his side, curls in on himself, and stares at dream-Ingo's shoes. They start to take on the scuffs and stains he saw today, and Ingo's coat burns and tears away until it's old and worn. It's a patchwork thing. Wherever Ingo was, it had pulled these vestiges of his old life away at the seams. 

"What happened to you?" 

"I'm sorry. I don't know." 

Emmet curls further in on himself, and tries to be okay as dream Ingo squeezes his shoulder gently. It's not him, never was, but it's as close as he can get. 

The memory playing out above reminds Emmet that they never said goodbye, just "See you later," and "Stay safe." Little good that habit did them. 

"It's not fair. It's not fair that I’ll wake up and I won't know it's you."

When he uncurls himself to look at his not-brother, Ingo has tears running down his face. He says, "No, it's not," and Emmet wakes up. 

Ingo sits on the front step of the brick-and-stone facility and watches the towers--wind turbines--turn. The blades spin faster under the night sky than they had when he and Akari first witnessed them on the foothills. An eager preteen, daughter of the site manager, had explained to him earlier that wind power was more robust after dark, but that wasn't ideal because there is less demand for electricity during the overnight hours. Ingo carefully filed away this information about his new world, and perhaps too loudly thanked the girl for the ad hoc energy lesson. He wonders what they use the power for. 

At ground level, the air is crisp but calm. The river behind the Windworks roils as it rushes down from the hills where he and Akari arrived, past him to the nearby town that Iris, the other girl, explained that she, Elesa, and Emmet had traveled from. Beside him, a field of wild grass sways in tandem with the thrum of the turbines, a deep emerald green under the unshrouded moonlight. A few Pokemon, a Bidoof and then a Buizel, meander in the field, always avoiding the worn path to the building and the landing on which Ingo waits. 

Sneasel sits in his lap, curled up asleep, and Ingo strokes her back, allowing himself to briefly set aside the remorse and dread he feels at spiriting away one of the Lady Sneasler's children. That would be tomorrow's problem. 

Tonight, he had excused himself shortly after meeting Drayden, Emmet's uncle and, therefore, his own. Elesa and Ingo had formed an unsteady alliance out of sheer need, and agreed quickly that the closer Valley Windworks would be better than returning to town. Neither Elesa, Iris, nor Emmet were local, and the only person they knew nearby was waiting for them at the facility. 

Ingo didn't regret the decision, but he certainly resented it now. 

Drayden had caught Ingo off guard. 

When they arrived at the Windworks, Drayden rose immediately to action, relieving Ingo of his brother and asking Elesa, Iris, and Akari simple but pertinent questions regarding what had occurred. A makeshift bed cobbled together in the facility breakroom, gratitude expressed to the onsite engineers who had lent their support, Drayden finally closed the door behind his nephew and turned on Ingo with a fury. 

They covered similar ground as with Elesa. 

Akari, this time, intervened. That's when Ingo left, citing a need for fresh air. As far as he knew, they were still arguing behind the heavy metal door between them.

He breathes in and out on counts of three, then eight, then twelve. His vision swims, lightheaded at the crest of each inhale and the nadir of each exhale. 

His name is Ingo. 

He traveled here from Hisui, but he is not from there. 

There, he was the Lady Sneasler's Warden, and a member of the Pearl Clan. 

He taught new trainers, fearful still of Pokemon but eager to understand the bond they could share, how to battle and form partnerships. 

The girl with him is Akari, the hero of Hisui and chosen of Arceus. She traveled with him from Hisui, but she is not from there. 

Ingo is bringing her home. 

His brother is Emmet, and they are twins but do not remember one another. 

Ingo buries his head in his hands, barely caring to accommodate the sleeping Sneasel. She snores softly in his arms, and he wonders if she misses her mother. He hates himself for failing to notice, failing to account for the curiosity that each and every of the Lady's kits are born with. 

He catches the thought before it veers him off track. That is tomorrow's problem, he reminds himself again.  

As if anticipating his spiraling thoughts, Chandelure phases into view in front of him. Though her arrival is silent, she announces herself with that bell-like sound, albeit softer, and Ingo lifts his head. Her flames are dim, which Ingo recalls indicates that she's tired. 

"Are you sure you don't want to return to your pokeball and rest?" 

She trills, high to low. A no. Ingo hums in disagreement, but doesn't protest. It’s not necessarily his place to insist. Chandelure is and isn't his Pokemon, a feeling that doesn't strike him as particularly odd. He wonders if he and Emmet raised their Pokemon together, blurring the line of who belonged to which trainer. Chandelure, for her part, seems to have a will entirely of her own. 

"I don't know what to do, Chandelure," he says before he realizes it.. She bobs in the air, which Ingo takes as an indication to continue. 

"I could leave, and conduct Sneasel back to her mother." Chandelure sets off a short burst of her flames. "I know, I know. I don't intend to. But this is so much, so fast. All I wanted was to return Akari to her station, and perhaps in doing so find out something about who I am.

"I know there's a means to restore their memories of me, and that Akari has a lead, but I find myself feeling less hopeful after," he pauses, sucks in a breath. "After it appears that I've done more harm than good in trying to return."

Chandelure floats down so that she's eye level with Ingo, and simply looks at him. Like the wild grass beside him, her candle flames tilt and sway but the wind seems to have little say in her direction. He knows well that her fire may not burn but can still cause harm. Yet, he also knows now that she would never harm him, so he lays a hand on her glass and says, "Thank you for listening, Chandelure. I am glad you found me." 

They stay like that for some time, Chandelure, Ingo, and Sneasel. After, though still uncertain, Ingo knows nonetheless that he has avoided the issues at hand for too long. He removes his hat, flips it over, and nestles Sneasel inside, then pulls himself to his feet. He hooks one arm around the hat and holds Sneasel close to his chest. With the other, he scrubs a hand over his face to set his expression, and counts to three. 

Ingo opens the door. 

Drayden's booming voice is immediately apparent, saying, "Of all the idiotic and naïve things--" but, to Ingo's surprise, he's cut off. 

Before Drayden can finish his thought, a voice that Ingo almost doesn’t recognize states, "I am going to trust him.” It's the clipped, intentional manner of speech that has Ingo's legs carrying him into the bullpen as the realization settles in. Amid their small group, Emmet stands inches beneath his uncle’s down-turned chin, grinning up at his furrowed brow. When Ingo reaches the room, Drayden breaks eye contact to glance his way, at which point Emmet pivots on his heel to face Ingo instead. 

" Very good timing! I was just telling my uncle that he is sorry about earlier. Thank you for your help in the forest," he says, and Ingo has to restrain himself from watching Drayden's response. 

Instead, he focuses on Emmet and says, "Of course. I hope you're feeling better?”

"Much, thank you. It turns out that bodies need sleep. Who knew?” He pauses, searching Ingo’s face. “I haven’t introduced myself." He thrusts out his hand, and when Ingo takes it, says, "I am Emmet. I am the Nimbasa City Subway Boss. Would you like to battle, Ingo?" 

Several in the room shout in alarm. Ingo isn’t paying attention. Emmet's grip is firm, as if the handshake alone is a competition, and his stare is sharp and focused. He's a far cry from the scattered man Ingo encountered in the woods, and he is reminded of his first memory of Emmet back in Wayward Cave. 

'I like winning more than anything else.' 

Without further hesitation, Ingo agrees.

Chapter Text

Ingo selects Haxorus and Archeops to fight alongside Chandelure. Though Emmet knows that they, in fact, chose him, he can’t decide whether Ingo recognizes this or simply picked the two at random. 

What’s important is that Archeops and Haxorus had reacted to Ingo. All Emmet’s Pokemon had, but those two in particular had nudged inches forward in the lineup, Archeops preening his feathers in feigned disinterest while Haxorus peered down her nose at Ingo and snorted in his face. For them, this behavior was downright charming, and even more interesting when Ingo took their bait. 

Emmet, in turn, goes with Eelektross, Excadrill, and Galvantula. There’s an advantage to considering his team selection more carefully, but tonight Emmet picks whoever looks as eager as he feels to battle Ingo. This is fairly straightforward. After Ingo’s choice, Klinklang and Garbodor had pulled back, reserved, and Emmet thanked them for being brave enough to come out for everyone before returning them to their pokeballs. Crustle and Durant chittered to one another in the corner, the gossips, and Emmet left them to it. He needs all the eyes he could get, and theirs are compound. 

Teams selected, it was onto the other issues at hand. 

Uncle Drayden seethes in the corner. Iris is in charge of him, a tacit agreement made through meaningful glances and a surreptitious promise of to challenge her in Opelucid via the Xtransceiver. Emmet hears snatches of their conversation, mostly his uncle’s gruff muttering about how he’s going to throttle Emmet if he doesn’t get himself killed first.

Later, Emmet will be sure to thank him for the vote of confidence. 

This leaves Emmet with the staff. It’s late, and their kindness both to Emmet while he was unconscious and to all of Unova for tolerating his uncle’s likely incessant questions about renewable energy is quite enough for one day. He finds the Plant Manager at his desk, chair swiveled to face the floor-to-ceiling bookshelf against the far wall. He’s thumbing through a heavy book printed with intricate single-line diagrams that Emmet expects represent the Western Sinnoh transmission and distribution system, based on the key that he can just make out in the corner. Single lines always reminded Emmet of early Castelia City tram maps, a thick thoroughfare with satellite offshoots branching out to key locations but lending no synchronicity to the design. 

Right. He was here for a conversation. 

Emmet hums, high to low, half of the effort of saying hello. Gracious has never been an expression he’s great at pulling together, but he tries to relax his face and not bare his teeth as the Manager spins his chair around to face him. “Thank you for all your help,” Emmet says, low enough so that his uncle can’t hear him over the hum of the transformers in the other room. “It’s very likely we won’t be discussing Opelucid City Power tonight. I’m sorry to have wasted your time. You have gone out of your way on my behalf. Is there any way we can be of assistance to you or the Windworks before we leave?”

In his initial excitement that Ingo agreed to battle him, Emmet hadn’t considered the recent aid of the Windworks crew, the potential for wanton destruction of fragile electrical equipment, and the evening hour. In his defense, it had been a very long day. While Ingo examined the Pokemon, Elesa had pulled him aside and set firm conditions to be met before the battle took place. 

First, there were the requirements:

1. Pacify Uncle Drayden. 
2. Thank the Valley Windworks staff and remove the group, plus Ingo and Akari, from the premises. 
3. Return to Jubilife City, not on foot. 
4. After the battle, one round only, return straight to the hotel. 

Second were the parameters: 

1. Emmet would, under no circumstances, travel alone with Ingo. 
2. If Emmet even blinked a little too long, Elesa was taking him to the hotel. 
3. If Emmet passed out again or anything close to it, he would go straight to the hospital. 
4. If Emmet has to go to the hospital or even to see a doctor, Elesa has his Chief of Staff on speed dial and she is standing by to start the paperwork for a leave of absence. 

Emmet knows all that allowed this battle, given Elesa’s and his uncle’s hovering, was the revelation that the only Pokemon that accompanied Ingo and Akari was Ingo’s strange, purple Sneasel. Had Emmet suggested a contest against an unknown team, Elesa would have shut it down in an instant. It’s in Emmet’s favor, since his secondary reason to battle is to watch how his own Pokemon interact with Ingo. Primary, of course, is that battling is an excellent judge of character. 

"...now, rescheduling isn't out of the question, but site visits require a fair bit of planning. There's the demand cycles to consider, the weather conditions, and any maintenance schedules to accommodate. I'm sure you understand?" 

Ah. 

Emmet needs to excuse himself from this conversation. How long had the manager been talking at him? Looking at his Xtransceiver for the time would be rude. Eyes dart instead behind the Plant Manager to the clock mounted on the wall in the far corner, then back. Two minutes and thirteen seconds gone. The Manager turns his head over his shoulder, and Emmet tries not to grimace when he looks back to him. 

Before he can recover his tact, Elesa comes to his rescue by yelling from the hallway, "Emmet? Good to go?" 

Emmet deferentially inclines his head towards the Manager and calls back to Elesa, "On my way!" Quickly confirming that the Windworks has his contact information, reiterating his apologies, he departs the office. Elesa meets him at the foyer and holds out her arm to link elbows. He does not comment when she presses close to his side. 

Outside, the group waits with two immense Salamence blocking the dirt path that leads Route 205. Nearer to far fenceline, Emmet's Pokemon and Sneasel all gather around Ingo, which is both, again, very interesting as well as highly effective at warding off Uncle Drayden's stink eye. The girl that traveled with Ingo--Akari--listens, enthralled, as Iris provides an impromptu lesson on Salamence’s flight anatomy and battle capability.  

His uncle clears his throat as Elesa and Emmet emerge. "The groups are Iris and Akari with Hydreigon, Elesa and Ingo with Iris's Salamence, and Emmet and myself with my Salamence." Elesa's forearm tightens around Emmet's bicep. "This is not up for debate." 

Squeezing her arm in return, Emmet says, low enough for only Elesa to hear, "If we let Drayden fly him, Ingo won’t make it to Jubilife." 

Elesa exhales a laugh and replies, "You sure I'm not considering the same?" 

Emmet unhooks his arm from hers and pivots to pat his hands on her shoulders, then beams. "I trust you."

The look he receives in return is beleaguered but fond, and Emmet knows he's won. They part with a quick hug, and Emmet wanders over to his Pokemon. In lieu of announcing himself, he pokes Chandelure's glass and asks, "Are you going to return to your pokeball now?" 

She trills and releases short, tired bursts of flame in assent. As her pokeball's red light washes over her, finally solid, he says, "Rest up! You need to give it your all for us in Jubilife."

As Emmet recalls the remainder of his team, Ingo watches closely and does not speak. He doesn't appear to have a pokeball for the Sneasel, which is asleep bundled in his uniform hat in the crook of Ingo's arm. His jacket, also Nimbasa City issue, hangs loose over his shoulders, worse for wear but nonetheless an exact, inverted match to the one that waits on Emmet's coat rack at home. 

Emmet wonders, half in jest, whether this man with his face is proof for Elesa that Emmet could, in fact, look more tired. It's with clear strain that Ingo holds his posture straight, only when looked at, and the bags under his eyes betray exhaustion beyond sleeplessness. Emmet's initial guess was that he was sleeping rough, or perhaps traveling, but closer inspection reveals that Ingo is clean, must regularly shave with decent razors in order to achieve that choice of a beard, and simply isn't carrying enough kit for mountaineering. Certainly trainers traveled light, but an infant Sneasel does not make a trainer. Or, at least, not one with reason to be otherwise alone off the tracks. 

"Are you alright?" Ingo asks. "If my appearance is disturbing to--" 

"Oh? Were you about to offer to hide your face for me? I wouldn't offer to fly blind with Elesa." Emmet's laughing, bewilderingly fond of this man already. Ingo's dour regard lightens somewhat, as well, which Emmet counts as another victory. It helps to have one, as his head pulses with the reminder of his earlier migraine. 

After his laughter tumbles to a close, Emmet shakes his head and raises a brow at Ingo. "Aren't you also surprised? It's reasonable to be caught off guard by someone who looks exactly like you. Across the world, even." Emmet pauses, considering, then fixes Ingo with an avid grin, all teeth. "That is, unless you know something that I don't?" 

With that, Emmet places three pokeballs into Ingo's stunned hands and hurries off. He files away the way Ingo's expression contorted from polite, to keen, to haunted, pupils dilating and expanding like a pulse with his mouth agape, caught mid-swallow. 

Emmet considers himself lucky that his double is less careful with his expressions than he is. 

Ingo must know why they look the same. That's the best explanation, especially when Emmet could push him like dominos tumbling messily toward a revelation. If Ingo knows, then there issomething to this, something worth knocking down the dominos for. 

"Fun talk?" Uncle Drayden says as Emmet approaches Salamence. Emmet sorts through potential replies, all snark, before landing on a shrug, and hoists himself onto Salamence's trunk. The Pokemon is kind enough to tilt over slightly so that Emmet doesn't have to request a boost from his uncle, so he's sure to give him extra praise once settled at the base of his neck. 

About a mile out from Valley Windworks, his uncle speaks again. His impressive timbre carries despite the roar of wind and the rhythmic beat of Salamence's wings. "Do you know what you're doing?" 

Luckily for Emmet, the subway taught him how to project. "Yes." Then kinder, "Please trust me." 

Emmet feels instead of hears his uncle sag with a weary sigh. "I'm trying to. Could you honestly say, Emmet, if a doppelgänger of Iris or Elesa appeared, carrying their unconscious body no less, you wouldn't have been upset? Scared?" 

"Doppelgänger is generous. I don't have a beard." 

"Emmet." 

He knows the answer, both the one that his uncle is looking for and Emmet’s own, which are closer aligned than Uncle Drayden seems to think. This isn't the place for this conversation, where Emmet has to gather his words thick and sure at the base of his throat in order to be heard. Flying is stress enough, even though he feels more secure on the Salamence that used to fly him in loops around his parents' garden, a lifetime ago. 

Beneath them, Jubilife tows into view in shades of blue and gold, all aglow under antique street lamps that line long, flat avenues carved into the mountains’ remains. The buildings are smaller here than in Nimbasa or Castelia. Only a handful of high-rise condominiums and office complexes encircle the city like a fortress, and Emmet imagines what it must be like to live without the comfort of skyscraper skylines as a reminder of the thousands upon thousands of lives enrapt in their own endless routines outside of his own, insignificant anxieties. 

"Emmet?" His uncle repeats, firm but not harsh, which Emmet understands as meaning ' Take your time, but I want your answer. '

Emmet hates him and loves him, his uncle turned not-quite-father that once decided that the best parenting occurs at a distance and ordered Emmet, at age fifteen, to complete his aborted Gym Challenge after a deemed-appropriate time for mourning his parents had passed. That is, until Iris, who transformed this man into something better resembling a parent through her sheer charm, exuberance, and just enough spite. 

"Didn't you see?" Emmet asks as Salamence starts his descent. "You had to notice. I was right. It wasn’t just Chandelure. All of my Pokemon reacted to him."

Evidently disinterested in rehashing this argument, his uncle just groans. Emmet expects they'll leave it there, but as they dip low enough that the roar of the wind gives way to the outskirts of Route 204, Uncle Drayden says, "I noticed. You were right. I'll give you that, but I don't know what you're expecting, Emmet. Just what do you think he is?" 

Emmet doesn't know. What else is there to do but find out? 

At a park a block away from the Jubilife City Pokemon Center, Emmet and Ingo face each other the requisite distance apart as Elesa announces the rules of their match. It's 9:34, but Sinnoan winter is dark and Jubilife has prioritized form over function with their choice of light, the street lamps glowing murky orange-gold and casting the park in more pine tree shadow than light. 

It's perfect, sans the lack of arena. They would have to make do. 

Elesa made the rules abundantly clear during her earlier lecture, so Emmet tunes her out and watches Ingo roll the three pokeballs in his right hand. The left still holds the hat with Sneasel, and Emmet realizes that since it doesn't have a pokeball, it must have flown via hat all the way to Jubilife. His inclination towards safety catches hard against utter incredulity. Apparently on a similar track, Ingo waves Akari over and, after a brief conversation, she scoops the Sneasel from the cap and jogs back to the sidelines. The Sneasel is displeased with this turn of events. Emmet would be too, the hat is surprisingly comfortable. He misses his own. 

Ingo holds the vacated hat limp at his side and settles on a pokeball. Elesa finishes officiating. Manicured barriers of topiary surround the park and between them, offset to the north, a fountain burbles. Nimbasa is punctuated with escapes such as this, the result of urban planning accounting for the human and Pokemon need for fresh air and a space to stretch their legs. Of course, they serve the dual purpose of just this: an area to battle where infrastructure stays unharmed and daily activities uninterrupted. 

Elesa shouts, "Start!" 

Emmet's smile is so wide that his cheeks hurt. Facing Elesa and the fountain, he pulls his left arm up to point skyward, pokeball tucked in a curled palm. With a flourish, he sweeps his pointed hand outward in a wide arch, sending his pokeball into the imagined arena. As Excadrill emerges from her pokeball with a high-pitched electric whir, Emmet's other hand reaches to habitually tug his hat over his eyes, but finds it missing, hanging on a coat rack in Nimbasa. 

Ingo wears his, though. A perfect mirror of Emmet, he stands with his back towards the arena with his right hand pointing skyward. Looking over his shoulder with the rim of the Nimbasa Subway uniform hat low over his brow, he clutches the pokeball close and then tosses it almost casually into the field. Archeops breaks free and Ingo pulls his hat further over his forehead and turns inward toward the battle, free arm arcing to point directly at Emmet. 

Iris cackles. Elesa swears. Ingo's movements could be taken as imitation or mockery, but Ingo is already in motion at the point Emmet's turning inwards to face the battle, their arms hitting the curve in tandem. Emmet catches, just under the shadow of his brim, Ingo's brows jump. Behind his tattered collar, Emmet can make out the beginning of a grin.

"So you can smile!" Emmet calls. It's a little underhanded, but Archeops knows earthquake, which means Excadrill needs to be fast and agility is not among her strengths. He hopes to fluster Ingo, based on a gut instinct that the comment would, in doing so securing Excadrill an opening to land a rock slide before Archeops won out with speed. 

With Excadrill's life orb and luck, Archeops could go down in a hit. An unlikely first hit was, in fact, their only chance. Unless Ingo doesn't know what he’s doing, Archeops is guaranteed to take Excadrill out with two turns of earthquake. Considering that Archeops carries a sitrus berry, they had one hit to work with and Emmet wants to land it with aplomb. 

Excadrill tears forward in a direct line at Archeops, rearing her claws overhead as rubble and stone gather behind her. 

She’s not halfway to Ingo's end when Archeops lifts from the ground with a powerful beat of his wings. Winning a speed contest is off the table. The earth between Archeops and Excadrill rips in two as Archeops sends heavy gusts of wind forward with his wings. The fissure rushes at Excadrill, rock and earth collecting upwards at the edges and then collapsing onto her once the rift reaches her paws. Emmet winces, hurting for Excadrill's unfortunate steel-typing given her proclivity for making earthquakes of her own, and shouts, "You've still got this!" 

But before Excadrill has time to gather rock slide again, the earth beneath them redoubles its effort to swallow her whole. Emmet, alarmed, looks back to Ingo to find Archeops mid-flap, clouds of dust encircling his talons, obviously mid-attack. 

What? 

With a cry, Excadrill collapses amid the rubble. 

What? 

Emmet's blood runs electric. Elesa and the others vanish from his periphery as his vision tunnels, fixed on the round's aftermath. On reflex, he switches out Excadrill for Eelektross and stares hard at Archeops, trying to ask without asking what his Pokemon has just managed to do. Archeops, the traitor, blinks back at him benignly and readies himself for his next attack as the remnants of his two-hit earthquake sink back into the earth. 

Emmet's gaze flickers to Ingo. Otherwise unaffected, he stares down Eelektross and yells out to Archeops, who pulls up higher into the air with a screech. 

Emmet gets on with it. 

"That's not going to help you, Archeops," Emmet mutters and Eelektross knows what to do. White hot coils of lightning crawling up his scales, Eelektross surges in tight twists and turns to a point catercorner to Aecheops's line of attack. It's a taunt, Eelektross has the advantage. The best option Archeops has is rock slide, and they all know he doesn't need the vantage point for that. 

"Wrong guess, Ingo!" Emmet shouts as Archeops dives for aerial ace. Eelektross's timing is exact, thunderbolt catching Archeops at the center-point of his plunge with a deafening snap, washing the park in a split second of void-light and sending a flock of startled Starly shrieking from the surrounding pines. The beam of Archeops's pokeball catches him as he falls, safe well before he hits the ground. 

Emmet has a hunch who's next. Eelektross returns to Emmet's side, curving behind his legs and nudging at his hand. "It looks like you've guessed as well," Emmet says, petting his fin between his thumb and fingers in a way that's, ideally, encouraging. 

Elesa just had to set the rule against switching out, hadn't she? 

Haxorus lands heavy on the field with a huff, sniffing the air before her amber eyes meet Emmet's and then slide down to Eelektross.

Haxorus breaks the mold. Though it doesn't actually physically drag Eelektross down, he sinks closer to the earth anyway as he pitches forward back into battle. It's thunderbolt again, of course, perfectly aimed to catch Haxorus in the snout just as the force of earthquake throws Eelektross back to Emmet's feet. The extraordinary combination of earthquake and thunderbolt has the ground roiling and roaring beneath them as lighting singes the air and the sky bellows in return. In the blaze, Emmet notices that Ingo's smile has broken into a wide grin. Emmet’s headache, faint, twinges, and he shields his eyes as the light dies down. 

Haxorus and Eelektross whine in harmony, and Emmet chuckles as he helps Eelektross right himself. The math isn't in their favor. Eelektross is done after one more of those hits, and isn't fast enough to land another thunderbolt before he’s down. 

But Emmet has an idea. 

He sends Eelektross in a wide arch around the battlefield, crackling with the buildup of another attack. Haxorus doesn't give chase, but she does turn around to slam down on all fours in Eelektross’s direction. Earthquake engulfs Eelektross, and Emmet recalls him as soon as he's sure the damage is done. With his other hand, he's sending Galvantula ahead. The ground between her and Haxorus is still resolving itself, but Galvantula is an expert at navigating uneven terrain, her legs carrying her over crag and cranny as her forceps ready x-scissor. 

Haxorus is mid-turn and Galvantula's scope lens flashes in the light of the streetlamps when the slashes strike, clean and sharp. Haxorus's tough armor, even the mineral scales that breach the line of her back, won’t be enough. Galvantula lands a critical hit. 

Haxorus falls. 

Emmet looks across to Ingo again, surprised to find him clapping in delight at losing a Pokemon to a stroke of luck. "Bravo!" he says, voice clear and loud across the field. Emmet gawks at him, lost, then can't help and smile genuine in return. 

That slips, though, when Ingo switches out Haxorus for his last Pokemon. Chandelure phases onto the field. Emmet and Galvantula share a look. 

"Ah." 

The grass beneath them wilts with the force of overheat, Galvantula with it. 

Emmet loses. 

He has a script for this. It shouldn't be hard to remember, given that battles he loses tend to be the most challenging and, therefore, exciting. This was no exception. But here his memory derails and, with it the right thing to say and do. His words bounce back and forth along the walls of his skull and by the time they arrive on his voice, he's completely off script. "That was incredible,” he says, quiet and earnest. 

Ingo, who had approached Emmet while his brain restarted, extends three pokeballs in his hand and says, "Yes, that was an excellent battle. Your Pokemon are flawlessly trained. I suspect I had an advantage, based on my choices and who you battled alongside."

Emmet shakes his head. "Nope!" He fastens the three pokeballs back to his belt, and once satisfied his team was secure and accounted for, Emmet gathers his thoughts and narrows his eyes at Ingo. "How did you get Archeops to attack twice before Excadrill could once?" 

This was only one of many questions, but it appears to be a good track. Ingo seems genuine when he asks, "You don't fight with agile and strong styles?" 

Wasn’t that interesting?

Emmet had battled plenty of opponents from Sinnoh and around the world. Those terms weren’t familiar, and the particular way that Archeops had maneuvered the second attack was, as far as Emmet knew, unique. Earthquake doesn’t cause Pokemon to flinch, and Excadrill had clearly started his attack before the second hit. 

"Ingo, where are you from?" 

Elesa grabs his shirt collar, yanking him backwards. "No. Not happening. Emmet, that is a conversation for tomorrow and tonight we are going back to the hotel." The rest had gathered in various emotional states. Akari started the scale at delighted, where it ended by way of Elesa at weary and Iris at baffled to land on Uncle Drayden at downright unsettled. The Sneasel, an honorable mention, sleeps on. 

Pulling against Elesa's grip, Emmet considers insisting and thinks better of it. Rather, he accepts the triumph in there being tomorrow where they can have that conversation. Provided that Ingo and Akari even reside nearby. To Ingo, Emmet asks, "I would like to talk more. Where are you staying?" 

Akari and Ingo glance at one another. 

Emmet was afraid of that. He cringes internally at the situation he's put the two in, especially given Elesa's and his uncle's behavior towards them. Unable to walk back the question, Emmet tries an offer instead. "You ended up here after helping me. I could offer a hotel room for the night as a fair reward for your win? And then we could continue our conversation tomorrow." 

The set of his mouth and brow suggests that Ingo plans to refuse, but Akari is staring up at him with stars in her eyes, clutching his sleeve. Ingo relents. 

The next morning, Emmet and Akari make eye contact over the breakfast bar and beeline for each other, plates temporarily abandoned on the self-serve counter. Once face-to-face, both mutely blink once, twice, before Akari breaks first and says, "I didn't have a plan, actually, I just didn't want you to get away." 

Emmet relaxes tight shoulder blades, surprised and elated that somebody else shares this habit. Akari continues, "If I've got your attention, I vote we get food and," she draws out the conjunction, tossing her head towards the dinette to assess the options. After a beat, she points at a table in the far corner, wedged between two windows that look out onto the Pokemon garden that the hotel provides, and says, "sit there!" 

Gathering his bagel, a fresh cinnamon raisin, and double espresso, Emmet arrives at the selected table before Akari. Leaning on the flat of his palm, he watches a Bibarel puttering about the yard and allows the din and clatter of the restaurant to collapse into ambient white noise. 

Between yesterday's unplanned naptime and what’s as close as Emmet gets to a full night's sleep, he feels rested enough to sit present in the moment without veering for the nearest distraction. He's not perfect, having already reviewed and returned twenty-three emails from bed before receiving a single, formality-free reply stating that it was after hours, that Emmet was supposed to be on leave, and that the subway would survive without him. But he was trying, and that had to count for something. 

Besides, now Emmet has a puzzle, something to solve to keep his hands and mind from sitting idle. 

Akari drops her tray down in front of him, sending her miso soup sloshing around the rim of its traditional lacquered bowl. She plops with comparable velocity into the chair across the table and says, "Are you eating a cold bagel?" 

Emmet, to make a point, tears off a quarter of the unsliced bagel and pops it in his mouth, eye contact unyielding. He swallows it down with the coffee and says, "And espresso. Nimbasa City special."

"I don't believe you."

"Cold pizza is also a delicacy in my borough. The eau de refrigerator adds a certain bite that's to die for."

Akari gags around her rice, laughs, then adds, "Man, I missed fridges, though. Reheated takeout can hit like nothing else." 

Emmet almost doesn't catch it because he's laughing alongside her, but he has to pause and wonder what life she has been leading to miss refrigeration. He intends to ask, but he's mid-swallow and she's moving on. 

"So, anyway, thanks for losing last night. I bet on Ingo and, you know, I have no money." 

Emmet bristles, smile dragging taught. "Why do you both think that I gave up the fight? I'm the one who challenged Ingo. If a battle is not serious, it’s not fun. I thought it would be fun to battle him. It makes no sense that I would not take it seriously." 

Elbows on the table, he leans forward on folded knuckles. Akari is staring at him, her spoon suspended mid-scoop, but she doesn't look surprised or frightened by his sudden tone shift. She looks invested. Unimpeded, Emmet continues. "Besides, I do not throw fights. I like--" 

"Winning more than anything, right?" 

Ingo may look exactly like him, but Emmet sees a lot of himself in the intensity Akari wields now.  

This time Akari persists, staring past him out the window. The Bibarel, Emmet assumes, carries on with its meandering. "I don't think you threw the fight. I think you gave it your all. Your team, too. But you let your team choose who fought with and against Ingo, and who sat out. Your Pokemon are very specifically trained with combinations in mind, I can tell. That opens them up for weaknesses that, I bet, are far more pronounced when they're up against each other." Her attention drifts back to Emmet and her expression carries a note of finality that belays argument. "It wasn't a no-win scenario, but Ingo was right. He had the advantage." 

She takes a demure sip of her green tea and Emmet wonders where Akari and Ingo have been hiding all his life. In the absence of words, he holds up a hand in mock surrender and uses the other to down the remains of his coffee. They lapse into thoughtful silence, breakfast suddenly the priority. 

Shortly thereafter, Elesa approaches their table with a black tea and fruit, perfect makeup and hair obscuring the fact that she was awake roughly two hours earlier than she'd prefer to be, by Emmet's guess. "Thanks for the note," she says, tone suggesting that perhaps ' food time back later' was insufficient information. 

Emmet ignores this and says instead, "I am going to battle Akari next." 

In unison, Akari and Elesa reply, "No.” Emmet deflates. 

Akari hums, apparently catching a thought. "That reminds me," she says. "What's the word for the place you store your Pokemon? I'm completely drawing a blank, I just don't think tea has enough caffeine for me." 

"The PC?" Emmet suggests as Elesa tries, "The Pokemon Center?" 

One of them must click, because Akari claps her hands together, beams, and thanks them. She drinks down the dredges of her miso and abandons a quarter of her rice, saying, "I should get Ingo up, probably? Before Sneasel suffocates him. She sleeps on his face. It's hilarious." 

She runs off and, not before swiping a fistful of protein bars from the bar, passes beyond the swinging cafeteria doors into the lobby. Elesa slides into Akari's vacated chair. Emmet makes short work of his bagel, ignoring Elesa's dismayed stare at his choice of food. 

Two minutes and eleven seconds later, the doors fuss on their hinges as Ingo shoves through, wild-eyed with sleep-mussed hair. Sneasel clings precariously to his shoulder, looking like a Pidove hatchling after its first flight. Ingo catches sight of them and crosses the dining room in four long strides. "Akari? Have you seen Akari?" 

Ingo, it turns out, took the stairs, and Akari the elevator. 

The five of them crowd a table in the Jubilife City Pokemon Center as Akari interfaces with the PC in the corner. Cleaned up, but still not dissuaded of his tattered uniform coat and hat, Ingo watches her while the rest of the group watches him. 

Between his outburst at breakfast and meeting the others in the lobby, Ingo had shaved. Where their resemblance was obvious before, Emmet could tell by how his family looks at Ingo that it had tipped to uncanny. 

The only mirror in his Nimbasa apartment was the medicine cabinet, the old standing mirror he inherited from his parents' house thrown away just over four years ago after a fit of anxiety led to a diligent spring cleaning session. Still, Emmet looks exactly like this man, down to the straight slope of their noses, the cut of their jawlines, and even their haircuts. Facial hair, or lack thereof, and all. 

Uncle Drayden appears the most disconcerted, teeth clenched and gaze hard. Though, if the timestamp on the text she sent last night is any indication, Emmet knows Elesa stayed up late last night trying to figure Ingo out, as well. 

Her theories include super-fan, struck through, long-lost sibling, and a nested label entitled ' Pokemon Fuckery ', which lists a handful of legends and a note to ask Professor Juniper, underscored, bolded, and italicized. 

They discussed her ideas over Emmet’s second coffee, agreeing that Ingo was too identical for the first. He was fairly confident that his parents hadn't spirited away a twin brother, but it wasn't as if he could ask them. They did not rule it out, but Emmet was far more interested in Column C anyways. He adds his vote to Sinnoh's Giratina as well as the more vague ' dimension nonsense in Alola?? ', and Elesa concedes that she’s unsure how to even broach the subject with Ingo. 

From the PC, Akari cheers, causing Ingo to rise and hurry over to her side. Sneasel remains on the table, sniffing at Uncle Drayden's hand. Iris asks why she's purple, but her father is lost in thought and, therefore, otherwise useless. 

"A regional variant?" Elesa tries, holding out her hand for Sneasel to investigate. She twitches her nose at the smell of fresh nail varnish. 

"Not one I've heard of." Iris says with a pout, and turns towards Akari and Ingo. "I guess what I've heard of and understand doesn't really matter, though." 

Emmet scoops up the little Sneasel, delighting at her indignant grumble. "Understanding isn't a single destination. If you operate assuming finite beginnings and endings, the track will always be endless in front of you with no station in sight. That can be exciting. But it can also be daunting." He tickles the Sneasel under her chin until she begins to purr. "Usually I prefer the challenge. I aim for the end of the line and proceed full steam ahead. On this journey, I think that the new challenge lies in accepting that we may not be able to anticipate the course."

Iris's wide eyes remind Emmet of her at six, new to the family, when Emmet carried her through Chargestone Cave just to show her that, if timed right, the floating rocks sing like glass when struck with a carefully pitched stone. This time, she says, "Who are you and what did you do with my cousin?" 

Emmet bends forward, shifts Sneasel to one arm, and holds his hand perpendicular to his cheek as if to keep Elesa and his uncle from reading his lips. He jerks his head towards Ingo, who is returning to their table, and says, "We switched looks before you woke up. Convincing, right?" 

Sticking out her tongue, Iris flicks his nose, mimics his head tilt towards Ingo and says, "Not a chance. My Emmet couldn't hold a frown that long if he tried." 

As Emmet tries to arrange his face into Ingo's characteristic look, ignoring the way it makes his head pound, the Pokemon Center door drones open. A boy, roughly the same age as Iris and Akari, stumbles in and scans the lobby, wheezing. 

"Has," the boy starts, jogging to the front desk and then leaning over to grip his knees and catch his breath. "Has anyone just used your services for a Rapidash, Froslass, or Torterra?" 

Behind him, Ingo makes a strangled sound. Emmet turns to see Akari pitch forward and grasp the table white-knuckle tight. Her long hair veils her face so that Emmet can't make out her expression, but Ingo stares at the boy, pale, with the tendons in his neck pulling taut. 

The boy isn't paying attention to them yet, so Emmet swiftly gets to his feet and steps into Ingo's line of sight. "What's wrong?" Emmet asks, but forgets to rise his voice with the question, because something haunts him in the way that Ingo looks through him, then. 

A hundred scenarios run through Emmet's mind, none of them encouraging. Elesa, meanwhile, tries to rouse Akari to no avail. The nurse informs the boy that, regrettably, nobody had dropped off any of those Pokemon today. Emmet starts to reckon with whether Ingo and Akari stole Pokemon, and he's had to deal with thieves before, when Akari brushes past him and into the lobby concourse. 

"Hi. You're looking for these ones, right?" Akari holds three pokeballs cupped in her small hands and the boy's relief is palpable. He doesn't appear to expect what Akari says next, though:  "They’re mine." 

"What?" He gasps more than says, as if the air he just regathered is punched out of his chest. "No--no they're not? They belong to Professor Rowan. You have to--" 

Akari interrupts. "Look, I can't remember what it is, but there's some way that Pokemon are tracked to their trainers. These Pokemon aren't tracked to your Professor, or else I wouldn't have been able to pull them from the box," she explains with surety, as if her hands aren't shaking. 

"That's just a glitch! I just ran here from Sandgem because out of nowhere these Pokemon were just withdrawn from the lab. Besides, if they belonged to you, I'd recognize you. I have no idea who you even are." 

Though clearly flustered, the boy makes an effort to speak level and calm. So when Akari flinches, visibly and viscerally, Emmet is rushing to her side. The familiar flutter of the Nimbasa Subway uniform jacket informs him that Ingo follows. Both of them, towering behind Akari, must look fearsome, and the boy shrinks into his shoes. The kid is quick though, absorbing the apparent shock and transforming it to recognition, followed fast by bewilderment. 

"Are you the Nimbasa City Subway Master?" He says to Ingo, and Emmet can forgive the mistake given the uniform. "I didn’t know you had a twin? And are those---are those Gym Leaders Drayden and Elesa behind you? And Champion Iris?" His voice picks up speed as his focus appears to expand beyond the immediate problem. Emmet takes this opportunity to pluck the pokeballs from Akari's hands, unzips her strange pack, and stores them there. Ingo clutches her shoulder, and Emmet notices his hands are trembling, too. 

The boy notices the movement and whips his head back towards them, his cap coming slightly askew. As he does, his eyes shift from Akari, to Emmet, and then to Emmet's shoulder, where Sneasel perches. He opens his mouth, says nothing. He closes his mouth. He tries again. On the third try, he finally manages, words muddling together in his rush to speak. "I'm sorry, is that an extinct Sneasel variant on your shoulder?" 

Luck favors them when it turns out that Uncle Drayden and Professor Rowan are professionally acquainted, nigh friendly even. The group, now seven plus Sneasel, alleviates the Pokemon Center of their ruckus and makes the short hike to Sandgem Town. The boy agrees it would be best to resolve this all with Professor Rowan present. He introduces himself as Lucas. While clouds breach the high noon sunshine, Emmet pretends not to see the wisps of her breath in the cold as Akari whispers the name over and over again as they head south. 

His uncle greets Professor Rowan with a severe handshake and booming laugh at what must have been a joke, though Rowan's tone gave no hint of humor. This starkly contrasts Ingo's response upon seeing the man. Like a Herdier with its haunches raised, Ingo's shoulders pull up to his ears. He overtakes Akari, placing himself between her and the laboratory workspace. Akari, too, reacts, though unlike with Lucas, she only appears mildly surprised. Slowly, carefully, she wraps her arm around Ingo's, and inch by inch his defensiveness wanes. 

"I didn't know you had two nephews, Drayden," Rowan says, as if one can just hide a pair of identical people, perhaps switching them out when convenient. 

"I do not." 

Rowan makes a thoughtful sound, but does not dignify Uncle Drayden ‘s obvious rancor with a complete response. Instead, he redirects to the matter at hand. He looks to Akari. "So, you are the one who recalled Torterra and the others from Jubilife Pokemon Center." Shifting then to Ingo, he continues. "You are not Drayden's nephew and therefore not Emmet's brother, despite all appearances to the contrary. And that is a centuries extinct Hisuian Sneasel on your shoulder. I'm not certain which I want explained first." 

Stepping out from Ingo's shadow, Akari says, "I told Lucas and I'll tell you. These are my Pokemon. I raised them.” 

Evidently disinterested in a reply, Akari elects to release Torterra into the center of the lab. The Pokemon forces a wedge between Rowan, Lucas and Drayden and the rest of the group, encompassing nearly the entire span of the available open space. The shelves rattle on their hinges and the machinery tilts on their anchors as Torterra turns himself around. In his achingly slow circle, Torterra's keen eyes examine each of them until they land on Akari. Emmet hears so much heartache in the low, rumbling whine he exhales as he trudges forward and shoves his nose, firm and somehow still gentle, into her stomach. 

Akari buckles, bowing her head against the steel rim of Torterra's shell and sinking to her knees to wrap her arms around his wide head with no trouble accommodating the spikes. Into Torterra's neck, she says, "I raised him. I raised him from a Turtwig, he was my first ever Pokemon, and it's been so long since I've seen him. I know, I know you don't know who I am but you can't take him away. I can't lose him again." She begins to cry. "Please." 

In the stunned silence that follows, Emmet can only look to Elesa, stricken, and wonder whether a glance can convey the growing horror that's begun to gnaw its way up from the pit of his stomach. Part of him wants to joke, to say, 'We can strike long-lost brother off the list because this is clearly some Pokemon fuckery', but his voice tastes like bile and his sense of humor like ash. 

Elesa grabs his hand and squeezes twice, a signal to check his Xtransceiver. The screen reads: 'I think you were right about your Pokemon' . Emmet doesn't follow at first, too absorbed in the loss and reconciliation and fear before him. When he does realize, it steals the air from his lungs and the color from the room. Frantic, he pulls his hand free and types out a reply. Emmet doesn't bother to hit send: Elesa's watching him type.

'They recognize him. Did I?'

Both Emmet and Elesa turn to Ingo, who is crouching behind Akari and watching with frigid animosity as Uncle Drayden and Rowan circumvent Torterra. He's still fixated on Rowan and Emmet knows if Ingo lashes out that the situation will only deteriorate. 

So Emmet intervenes. 

One, two, three paces inwards, and he's next to Ingo and Akari. He snatches up Sneasel to hush her hissing, and signals to Ingo behind him with his other hand, fingers splayed out. 

Please, trust me . 

With a hitched inhale and a staccato exhale, Emmet smiles. It's all he knows how to do, here before the unknown and the fury it has wrought. His uncle already shakes his head in dismissal, but Emmet was never the one that listened to him. "I met Ingo yesterday but my Pokemon fought with him like lifelong partners. My Chandelure led me to these two in the woods and she knew him, even when he didn't know her." Emmet lays his free hand on Torterra, hoping he's friendly. "Something is seriously wrong. I think our Pokemon’s reactions prove that." 

Akari hiccups. "They still remember. You don't."

Ingo nods beside her, and adds, "I recognized Chandelure and regained some memories of Haxorus, Archeops, and Emmet’s other teammates during battle. I have little to rely on, but I am as sure as Akari is of Torterra that I have battled with his Pokemon before."

Elesa, never far from Emmet's side, asks, "Do you mean Emmet's Pokemon, but you're own? In a dimensional, multiple universe theory kind of way? Or?" 

Akari laughs, wet and fragile. "No, no. The same. I mean, I can't answer for Ingo here, but it would be exceptionally cruel if we'd been dropped in some kind of parallel world." She scrubs at her puffy eyes, whispers something to Torterra, and the lab is first red and then gray again as Torterra returns to his pokeball. "I'm really sorry, Professor Rowan, everybody. You must be so confused. I promise I didn't steal these Pokemon, but I won't keep them if you don't believe me." To Ingo, she says, "I'm sorry, Ingo. When I said I wanted to bring us home, I didn't think it would be this hard."

"Akari," Ingo says, voice tight. "I don't regret a moment." 

Professor Rowan clears his throat. Emmet doesn’t expect to find his eyes shining. Lucas has approached too, looking a little misty himself. Emmet wants to shout something about empathy at his uncle, but finds even Uncle Drayden is regarding the scene with an unclenched jaw and softened brow. "Young lady," Rowan says, "I regret having caused you so much distress. Having caused you all distress, however inadvertently. It was not my intention, nor do I intend to reclaim those Pokemon."

When Akari gasps, he only huffs and continues. "They have been cooped up in my lab far too long, and I have come to realize that it's been some time since I have seen Torterra that happy. And, you," he says, considering Emmet. "You, I believe, are onto something. I did not, after all, train or evolve that Torterra myself. Neither did my assistant, nor the trainer I trusted with one of Torterra's companions. These are obvious questions I am, frankly, surprised to have found myself overlooking. Not to overstate my intelligence, but rather it is my responsibility to monitor the Pokemon in my care. Yet, until this morning, the three Pokemon that you claimed sat in a box, unheeded or, rather, forgotten, for over a year.

"Hence I sent Lucas to investigate, not just out of fear of foul play, but in the hope of understanding why it was as if the Pokemon had simply emerged into my awareness in time to be withdrawn. While this conversation has left me with more questions than answers, I feel as if your presence creates the possibility of answers, which is more than enough. I only ask, if you choose to seek them out, that you would allow Lucas to accompany you. Of course, provided he's willing?"

Out of the corner of his eye, Emmet sees Lucas nod eagerly, but he is fixated on his uncle. Over the course of Rowan's diatribe, Uncle Drayden blanches and his eyes unfocus, flickering back and forth between two vacant points on the floor. By Rowan’s closing question, his uncle's skin is ashen and stare glassy. As Lucas nodded his fervent assent, Uncle Drayden scrambles out of the lab.  

"Dad?" Iris calls after him, but the doors rush closed and she's forced to follow with a quick, "Sorry about him!” 

Lucas is blissfully unaware of that drama and forges ahead. "Professor Rowan, to be fair, even though you gave them the offer of not being willing to seek answers, I feel like you assumed that they have a means and direction?" 

It's a fair point. Emmet had initially expected Akari and Ingo to have the answers, finding them a matter of twisting the puzzle box and keeping track of all the moves up made. But Akari and Ingo both mentioned forgetting, a thought which made his stomach twist. Just how long had they been wandering before Chandelure found them? If Elesa hadn't schemed to drag him to Sinnoh, what then? 

Emmet sets the thoughts aside as Ingo speaks. "We traveled here with a route in mind, and Akari has a lead on the major junctions. A map to confirm our track would set us right."

With an affirming, if still shaky, noise, Akari nods and says, "Actually, on the way here I think I remembered something. Lucas, Professor Rowan, is Lake Verity nearby?" 

Both confirm as the lab door jolts open again. Iris leans in the entryway, jamming the swing and letting cold air blow in, a cruel disruption of Emmet's brief respite from winter. Any complaint is cut off, though, as Hydreigon blusters in and Emmet realizes that Iris is breathless. "I tried, I tried," she heaves, a mirror of Lucas's struggles at the Jubilife Pokemon Center. Inhale, exhale, then again, she says, "I tried but I couldn't just disappear on you."

"Iris, what happened?" 

Uncle Drayden had left, bound for Unova. 

Chapter Text

Over tea, Ingo starts at the beginning.

"I arrived in Hisui with nothing but my name and this uniform. I came to in the Alabaster Icelands, and only survived thanks to the Lady Sneasler, this kit's mother, and the Pearl Clan, who took me into their care when I was wounded and lost."

The words are leaden on his tongue, and Ingo's gaze anchors to the ripples at the surface of his tea that reveal his hands’ slight tremor. It's odd, the unease that accompanies this conversation, given how he had considered no option but candor in Hisui.  

He imagines the others as they listen. In the sparse maisonette, Akari and Ingo sit centrally underneath a low table smothered by a thick futon. Elesa folds her arm around Iris as they lean against towers of boxes near the entryway. Rowan busies himself with lunch while Lucas sits across from Akari with his notebook pressed flat on the table. Emmet has hoisted himself onto a stack of crates near the far window, but Ingo hasn't looked at him since he began speaking. Drayden, of course, is gone. 

He has forced Ingo's hand. Ingo wants to resent his uncle for this, to fold in on himself further and learn to detest the man who had unwittingly granted Ingo glimpses of his lost self in spite of his disdain and distrust. He doesn't understand but nonetheless endures the pang of abandonment, redoubled by Iris's apparent anxiety at her father's behavior. 

Ingo had thought, after Elesa’s immediate distrust in the woods near Valley Windworks, that perhaps it would be best to hold what limited truths he knows close to his chest. He realizes now that this was selfish, a wish to hold on to the idea of a reunion that he had dreamt of for years in Hisui. Instead, he has to face his family with honesty and receive disbelief, or the inability to believe , in return. 

Yet, Akari had been braver than him, as always was the case. Luck had carried him directly to his Pokemon, his brother somehow willing to share them without question. Akari had no such luck. The triumph of finding her Pokemon had immediately snagged on the conditions of their reality. Her life had been reduced to an oversight, and disrupting what’s forgotten bore consequences. 

Ingo would never have expected that first derailment to come wearing Rei's face. 

The differences were more evident now. As we're those between Professor Rowan and Commander Kamado. The uncanniness recedes to mere resemblance, and Ingo considers whether it was better or worse that Akari had landed in a Hisui haunted with faces from the world that she had been stolen from. 

And regardless of these things that haunt, she had faced the two of them and insisted on her place in their lives. While Ingo had found ease as a passenger, happy enough to allow the tracks to lead him where they will, Akari will not let their journey conduct them toward yet more loss. Not if she can prevent it. Torterra was hers, as were these two new-and-old faces and this world that Arceus left them to. 

She said to him in the hotel room the night before that she would only share their stories with the others with his blessing. The door she left open for him was a kindness. It ensured that he could avoid the hurt that she had no choice but to face. He suspected she offered this in light of her argument with Drayden, Ingo's departure for fresh air an indulgence of cowardice that wouldn't have been allowed in Hisui. 

The rejection stung, stings still. Elesa he had understood, even as flashes of looming steel monoliths and neon lights carried with it impressions of her, ever-changing but always Elesa. But she had mellowed somewhat, seeing that Ingo meant no harm and, critically, she trusted Emmet. That Drayden's protective, bitter ire had rejected Ingo in his entirety hurt, but it was intolerable to witness the chill that spread between uncle and nephew. Or, at least, with the nephew that Drayden remembered. Ingo didn't know if it was always like this, or if he was, in part, to blame for the growing rift. 

Ingo sips his tea, marveling at how it tastes so alike to what Rei would brew them in Jubilife after a long day at the Training Grounds. Sneasel pops her head briefly from beneath the futon to investigate the clatter his cup makes as he sets it on the wooden tabletop. He scratches the notch behind her growing ear feather and prepares to continue. 

"There was some hope, initially, among the Pearl Clan, that I would recoup my memories and they would be able to aid my return to my original station. I did not. If those injuries that I sustained on my first couple of days in Hisui were related to my amnesia, my physical recovery was insufficient as far as reversing it." He folds his hands together and wills them still. "It was apparent I was not from there, between my attire and my tendency to reference concepts foreign to Hisui. Still, the Pearl Clan accepted me. I became Lady Sneasler's Warden."

What would the Lady or Irida think of him now? When had uncertainty latched so firm, so thoroughly en route to becoming his second nature? 

"For three and a half years, that was my life. I kept mostly to the wilderness, with my Lady and later my team. The Coronet Highlands, my Lady’s station, was fairly isolated. I didn't mind. It wasn't until the day I met Akari that I remembered anything from my past life."

Memory is a slippery thing. Did the malignant longing that rattled his lungs at the image of his reflection in calm waters count as remembering? Did the ease with which he commanded Pokemon, or the joy of rare battles, reveal a part of Ingo that always knew who he was? 

At the end of a sigh, he murmurs, "I recalled a Pokemon I now know to be Chandelure, and soon after found myself captured by the notion of a different person in my past that shares my face. Emmet." The implicit fact of their relation could go unstated but Ingo adds, almost silent, "My twin brother." 

Professor Rowan places a platter of rice bowls on the tabletop and muses, "Surviving in the wastes to the south of Snowpoint when unprepared would be no small feat today. You are lucky to be here with us, young man."

Akari arm darts in front of Ingo’s line of sight to snatch a bowl with a sour chuckle. "In more ways than you know," she says, already gathering a heaping scoop of rice with lacquered chopsticks. 

Ingo hums and considers, appreciating the divergent track to follow, considering Emmet's silence. "Luck factors, yes, but as did the choice that Clan Master Irida, the Lady Sneasler, and my allies in Hisui made every day to stand with me. I was a complete stranger to them, and I know firsthand that the nature of my arrival wasn't easy to reckon with."

From behind him, Elesa inhales sharply through her teeth, as if burnt. Ingo turns rapidly over his shoulder, forgoing his determination to avoid looking at the others. She stares at the floor, expressionless. "No, no, I didn't mean to suggest that I hold your apprehension against you," Ingo says, fumbling for the right response and wanting nothing less than to tip Elesa's delicate favor against him. 

Beside her, Iris says, "It can be fair that we weren't sure about you and at the same time be, you know, not great for you either." She leans into Elesa's side, who doesn't respond except to lift the arm around Iris's shoulder up to ruffle her hair. 

"Quite," Rowan adds, returning to the table with the clay pot of tea. He seats himself beside Lucas and refills Ingo's cup, and Ingo, frayed, allows himself the moment's pause to listen to the smooth flow that signifies a high-quality pot and practiced pour. The pot's intricate enamel design depicts Starlys in circled flight around Gracidea flowers, all silky browns and pastel pinks. Ingo wonders whether it's an heirloom, and considers what his life has become that he feels a kinship with an aged teapot, out of time. 

Of course, he's not, not really. Because across the room sits his brother, and Ingo can feel him watching but cannot bring himself to face him. After all, what's worse? To look towards him and see skepticism behind his careful smile, or to find that he can look at his twin and have no idea what he’s thinking? 

"I don't blame you," Ingo says instead, nominally in reply to Iris. "It's not your fault that you've forgotten. I at least have the fragments of my memories to hold to, and they serve as an indication that I am on the right track. Without that, nor the obvious disruption that I experienced by so clearly not belonging in Hisui, I'm not sure what else I could expect from you."

Discomfort growing unbearable, Ingo plucks one of the rice bowls from the platter. This seems to signal to the group that they can do the same, Iris's hands collecting bowls for herself and Elesa and Emmet’s claiming two for himself. Before thinking, Ingo sends an apologetic glance to Professor Rowan, who is kind enough to not acknowledge it as Ingo snaps his attention back to the table. 

On their flight to Jubilife before the battle, Elesa told Ingo that whoever he was to Emmet or otherwise, he would have to earn their trust. His help had been appreciated, and she would not discourage Emmet of his curiosity. But her grace ended there, until he proved he was otherwise harmless. Though, yes, she had softened, Ingo still did not know whether he had proven to be anything yet. 

"So the situation around our memories differs from that with yours," Emmet states, shuffling the futon, and Sneasel underneath it, as he joins them at the table to eat. "Akari, you said something earlier about being certain that you belong to this world. You sounded like you knew who took you and had a say in being sent back?" 

Akari huffs. "I guess it's my turn. It was Arceus. Arceus took us and yesterday, or my yesterday, I asked him to send us back." 

Lucas's pen clacks on the table in a wavering rhythm before joining the rest of the room in absolute silence. Ingo almost wants to laugh, the absurdity of their reality almost light in such a simple declaration. However, he wouldn't deprive the others of the opportunity to process, as he once had, that the power to pull people out of time is not only extant but wielded where need arises. Even if it is a little funny. 

Lucas speaks first. "Excuse me?" He asks, voice up an octave, hand at the ready to seize his pen and take notes once he, presumably, knows for sure that he heard Akari right. For all Rowan's differences from Commander Kamado, Ingo cherishes this small similarity between Lucas and Rei beyond their faces. 

"Yep!" Akari says brightly, as if they can't hear the iron underneath. "Plucked from bed, dropped outside Jubilife Village without a name but with an Arceus-infused cell phone and a mission. Turned out being comfortable with Pokemon was an asset, and even without my memories, I still had that." For a moment, her tone suggests that she'll carry on telling of Arceus's mission, the frenzied Pokemon, and the rifts. But then she pauses, hums, and says instead, "Given Hisui is, well, your history here, I wonder if you have records about what happened? I bet it'd be more useful, for research, if you had those as a reference point."

As if pulled on a wire, Ingo turns to Akari, instinct overriding his intent to perceive nothing but the woodgrain of the table. He finds her fidgeting with her chopsticks over abandoned rice and greens, faraway eyes staring past Rowan and Lucas to the small window behind them. Ingo follows her gaze to see that it has started to snow. 

He thinks of Prelude Beach, alike to the coast he saw to the far south on the way into Sandgem. He remembers Akari's first and only winter in Hisui, a snowball fight on Practice Field between her and Rei, and the way fresh potato mochi tastes after the cold and wet has soaked through your clothes. 

The story that the others are looking for isn't complete without the moments in between. How do you tell them, though, without allowing room for the ghosts to follow? 

Centuries, Professor Rowan had said. Both Ingo and Akari had always suspected such, and perhaps even known intrinsically when they decided to return. It had been a defense mechanism, Ingo realizes, to insist on calling where they now were another world , thereby suggesting that Hisui and home could coexist. Standing on the ridges of the Coronet foothills moments after falling from Arceus's starry plane, Ingo knew that Hisui was here in the bones of this land, in the memory. 

The truth settled soft like the first cover of snow beyond the windowpane. How do you grieve a life that was never meant to be yours, and people you were never supposed to have met? When you live to tell the tale, how do you reconcile the bare facts with the years of it? 

Lucas finishes tapping at his device with a satisfied noise, and says, utmost professionalism not enough to mask the eagerness beneath, "I doubt any of the texts I just put holds on will cover the details with Arceus, though. I know we can cross-reference that against myths and legends of the time, especially since it seems like the two of you weren't complete unknowns and therefore might show up in some sources. Still, are we going to get back to the part where you asked Arceus, a God of Creation, for a favor? One that countered its original intentions with you? "

"Hey," Akari interjects, snapping to attention, "I did what it wanted. Caught all the varieties of Pokemon in Hisui, plus dealing with the extraneous stuff Arceus thought it didn't need to mention. After that, I realized Arceus was content to leave me there unless I told it to send me home. So I did, after asking Ingo to come with me." She grins and adds, "I mean, I had already defeated Arceus in battle. A request seemed fair game." 

They're saved from another silence by Emmet breaking out into an immediate, raucous cackle. Iris asks what Ingo is sure they're all thinking: "How can you be so casual when you're basically saying that you fought God and won?" 

Akari considers, then says, "Spite." Lucas snickers and begins to write in his notebook, causing Akari to lunge across the tabletop to grab at his hands and pen. "Hey! No! Don't write that! My opinions on Arceus are firmly off the record. Give me your stupid pen, Lucas!" 

She feints towards the pen with her right hand and catches the notebook with her left, scrambling out from beneath the futon and sprinting into the lab proper. Lucas follows. There's a clatter and clash as a war for the nearest writing utensil is fought and won, Akari's cheer a tell of a victor decided. 

In the kitchen, Iris asks, "Was she like that in Hisui? Just, like, fine with the challenges she has to deal with? It seems like a lot." 

"She is very resilient. I suspect I would have fared differently when I understood the nature of my route, had I not had her by my side." Ingo supposes that it's not worth confessing that he'd never have had a course to begin with, without Akari. 

Professor Rowan rises from the table to begin collecting dishes, leaving Akari's unfinished bowl where she left it. Ingo moves to follow, but Rowan sends him a stern look that has him staying firmly in his seat. Otherwise useless, Ingo is content to busy himself with the dregs of his tea until Emmet decides to speak. 

"When did you learn about our memories?" Emmet's voice is tight with forced volume, and between nearly a day in his presence and a lifetime of memories underneath a haze of forgetting, Ingo knows that this is unlike him. Finally, painstakingly, Ingo looks at his brother. 

And he recognizes Emmet's expression, the uneven upward turn of his brow revealing the lie in his deliberately neutral clenched-jaw smile. In place of the incredulity he anticipated and rejection he feared, Ingo found the face that Emmet makes, has always made, when he's desperately nervous and trying to hide it.

Ingo oscillates between nausea and relief with an intensity that favors the former. His heart jumps in his chest, sending a racket of bloodrush between his temples and eardrums. Certainly, Emmet had been only civil to him since they had met, but he had feared that the truth as Ingo knew it would be where their fragile bond would falter. The elation at being extended the benefit of the doubt was only derailed by the shame of himself having doubted in return. 

"We," Ingo starts, struggling to recover some sense of coherence. "We didn't until… Arceus informed us that it intervened on… It was the moment we left. We learned the moment before Arceus returned us here, within hours of finding you."

"Wait, what?" Elesa interjects, evidently finding her own voice. "It was within hours when Chandelure chased you down? That's fortunate."

"That's what I thought," Akari says, and Ingo turns to find her leaning in the doorway with a pen jammed behind her ear. Lucas is parallel, looking in equal parts defeated and at ease with it. Ingo wonders who Akari had been in his life before. Akari continues, "I'm going to consider it an apology from a certain someone. We got the directions to the Lake Spirits to fix this, right? It makes sense to me that an entity with its choice over the timeline would land us at a time and place that's convenient."

Rowan makes a thoughtful sound from the sink. "Be sure to note that down, Lucas. Magnanimity is an interesting character trait." Lucas pulls a fistful, likely the lab's stock, of pens from his trouser pocket, selects one, and uses his knee as a surface as he takes down the notes while balancing precariously on one foot. 

Emmet stands up, long legs catching on the splayed trail of the futon and knocking the surface of the table akimbo, sending Sneasel scurrying out from underneath. She scrambles up Ingo's jacket to her customary position atop his right shoulder, letting out a short, indignant shriek in Emmet's direction. Emmet sticks out his tongue at her, then collects his expression into something more serious and says, "The first lake is nearby?" 

When Akari and Lucas nod in unison, he smiles wide and throws his arm to point past them. "Onward!" 

While Elesa has to prevent him from racing ahead without consensus, it does not take much prompting for the group to reach an agreement to proceed. Sandgem greets them with a brush of snowfall under wide gray skies, and Lake Verity awaits. 

Afternoon finds Route 201 desolate save for their group of six. Iris and Lucas lead the way, animatedly discussing the role of Professor's assistant and Champion, Sinnoh and Unova, and a distinct lack of anything involving the upcoming Lake Spirit and what it stole from them. In contrast, Elesa and Emmet follow at the back, silent and resolute. This left Akari and Ingo in their midst, speaking softly, fairly aimlessly, about Akari's past encounter with Mesprit at Lake Verity both months and centuries ago. 

The scant dirt path that cuts between tracts of snow-dusted grass crunches underneath their feet. Though the snow itself had stopped, the cold air held inert in anticipation of its return. Ingo suspected it would fall heavy under night’s chill, and hoped that any blanket it laid in its wake wouldn't hinder their journey in the morning. 

Perhaps he was getting ahead of himself.

The path forks at a ledge and Lucas leads them up the incline, hugging the looming treeline. Satellite saplings converge upon the trackless stretch and Ingo finds himself considering whether he had ever passed these same trees during his travels in Hisui. He's spared from the increasingly familiar preoccupation, however, as Akari comes to a stop in the shade of one of those ancient firs, turning southward. 

She waves Ingo on, then Emmet and Elesa as they reach her. The remaining path to Verity is short, however, and no one is eager to leave Akari behind. They all assemble at the edge of the route where the wood gathers thick and an aged sign directs them to their destination. It doesn't appear that she pays them no heed, but rather that she's fastened in place, rooted where she stands, the only sign of movement the wind that tears strands of her hair free so that it whips around her face. 

A moment passes. Ingo realizes. 

He runs to her, Sneasel yelping in dismay as she's pulled along with him. Once by Akari's side, Ingo pitches his voice low and says, "Should we change course?" 

"I can't." Spell broken, she shakes her head, hair-tie coming entirely loose. With long hair spilling onto her shoulders and across her brow, Akari better resembles the girl that would go searching for trouble out on surveys, or the one who returned to Jubilife triumphant, yet so terribly small, after the red sky. She looks suddenly like a child, returned by the hand of a stranger to the arms of her mother after wandering lost in the woods. 

"I can't," she says again, firmer as if to convince herself of her own assertion. "I won't do it. Maybe if we hadn't--I'm sorry. Just. Let's go."

Akari walks away. Ingo looks southward to where the path dives through a clearing towards a wide green plain, and imagines which of the rooftops cresting the hillside belongs to a memory. Then, forward. 

Once regrouped, Lucas leads them through a short wooded trail to Verity Lakefront. The residue of afternoon's limited sunlight yearns for the frozen forest floor, and Ingo understands better Akari's penchant for the Hisuian wilds in the snatches of Starly's song and the endless eastward stretch of old growth pines, towering with their high boughs allowing a view towards the forests farthest reaches. 

The gentle gray-green glow of the conifer canopy gives way to a wash of gray as they emerge at the lake. The icy breeze off the water preserves the earlier cover of snow, pristine except for the low trail of a long-gone Bidoof and the fluster of a stray Starly that takes off as they approach. 

Lake Verity's still surface conceals the truth of its depths, and near to the bank Ingo can see clear to the bottom where hardy grasses weave around a lone Magikarp nibbling at the algae-coated embankment. In the center, the lake bows around an island outcropping on which Ingo can just make out a cave entrance. 

Behind him, the shrill whir of a pokeball release startles him, and Ingo spins to an Empoleon staring imperiously down at him. Lucas says, "I'll have Empoleon ferry us across. She's a fast swimmer."

Empoleon ruffles her feathers, peering across the group of six until landing on Akari. Then, her shrewd countenance transforms entirely, and she waddles quite rapidly towards Akari to envelop her in her wings with a prattling series of squawks. 

"Hi, Empoleon," Akari says, mustering a laugh. "I missed you, too." She pulls back to meet the Pokemon's sharp eyes. "Lucas and I would really appreciate it if you could carry us across. I know we have a bunch of big, gangly adults with us, but they promise to be polite. Right?" 

Ingo and Emmet pull into a mock salute in accidental concert, which earns them a fond eye roll. Whether it appeases Empoleon or the Pokemon wasn't planning on putting up an actual fuss, Ingo is uncertain, but she ferries them across to the landing one-by-one. Ingo has to hold fast to both Empoleon, whose speed is unmatched, and Sneasel, who is intent on pursuing a Surskit that skitters past them on the water, in order to make it to the island dry. 

Ingo is last to the cave entrance. The splintered pairs of their walk down Route 201 had converged into a single group, gathered close. Akari nods as Ingo approaches, searching. He returns the gesture, willing himself ready, and Ingo knows that it's only in his head but the shadow underneath the curve of the cavern entrance leeches towards them like the hungry dark, a reminder of the unknown that waits beyond this threshold.

As if sensing his unease, Emmet leans into his field of view, smiles wide and says, "All aboard! Right, Ingo?" 

And so they press on. 

The innards of the cavern are wide and damp, drops of condensation singing a pitter-patter melody as they fall onto the standing water below. A measured scan of the space confirms that the cave is a single area, and empty beyond their presence. Not even a Zubat hangs from stalactite ceilings. 

A shared look of confusion passes through the group, then a voice whispers from behind Ingo's ear. 

"You have come to face my challenge?" 

Iris, Elesa, and Lucas visibly startle, confirming Ingo's suspicion that this is another case of telepathic communication. Akari simply says, "Fuck," and Ingo cannot admonish her. He feels about the same way. A challenge was expected, given Akari's recounting of Hisui's version of this spirit, but he’s nonetheless disappointed that it's necessary when the Pokemon is meant to return what it has stolen. 

"Yes," Ingo and Akari say at once, both knowing their part.

In the midst of the standing water at the center of the cave, a small Pokemon with pink features and twin tails now floats, intelligent yellow eyes unblinking. It tilts its head slowly to the right, and the voice returns, "Are you certain that this is what you want?" Its airless whisper itching somewhere deep in Ingo's spinal column. "It is easier without it." 

"You're the Being of Emotion? You know--you hold ours?" Emmet asks, although Ingo can now recognize in his tone that the upward lilt of a question is more a formality than sincere interest. 

"I am. I do." 

Elesa, this time, speaks up. "Then don't ask questions you know the answers to." 

The Pokemon's eyes then close, its pink appendages swaying as it tilts its head in the other direction. Its form begins to dissipate, and for a harrowing moment Ingo wonders if they had offended it and lost their chance, but then its voice returns, distant, at his ear. 

"So be it." 

As Mesprit recedes from view, the ground beneath them begins to quake. Intuitively, Ingo hunches forward, letting Sneasel drop from his shoulder and catching her into his arms. With her secure against his chest, he spins to find Akari, knowing already that there's no cover in the cavern but hoping to provide what little he can. Except there's six of them now, and Emmet is his brother, and the tremor intensifies as he lunges towards Akari with his one free arm and cranes his head over his shoulder to call after Emmet.

White sclera stare back at him, wide and vacant. 

"Ingo?" Akari shrieks, twisting her wrist to pull at his own, and with it his attention back. But he's frozen in place, unable to react as Emmet stumbles backwards with a panicked cry. 

"Ingo, get down, the roof!" Akari shouts, yanking him towards her and to the ground. Instinct sets in and he's shoving Akari beneath his bowed shoulders. Despite safety considerations, he holds his head raised, sweeping the cavern for the others. Each of them, Lucas, Iris, and Elesa, share the same opaque-eyed state and Ingo can't get to them, can't help them. Not without--

Stop thinking. Act. 

"Emmet! Elesa is two steps to your 2'o'clock, get her and get down ," He bellows, shouting voice cracking from disuse or fear or both. Lucas is already down, hunched in the corner behind Empoleon, likely thanks to Akari. "Iris, release any of your Pokemon and crouch beneath them, now. "

Ingo can only hope they listen. He's still shouting when dust shrouds his sight, the rumble of the cave breaching, leaving Ingo to with nothing left to do but tuck his head and hope.

There's a shattering, solid crash, darkness, then silence. Ingo listens to Akari's rattled breaths, Sneasel’s jittery whine, and tightens his arms around them both until the echo of his own heartbeat subsides enough that he's confident he can stand. 

He helps Akari up by the forearm as he pulls himself to his feet, noting with some distant dismay that his number of creaking joints has expanded to his shoulders and spine. A small click beside him and the space briefly glows laser red, then subsides into softer oranges and golds as Akari's Rapidash appears from her pokeball. Rapidash whinnies restlessly and nudges at Akari's kimono, and Ingo takes stock while she tries to calm her down. 

Floor to ceiling slabs of rock cut off all ways but forward. Ingo lays his hand flat on the nearest surface, and the cold stone has no give despite how suddenly it appeared. He resists the urge to kick at these new walls, assuming that wouldn't be a particularly good show of resolve in the face of Mesprit's challenge. 

Turning back to Akari, Ingo asks her to confirm that she's okay. Despite the dramatics, he neither felt nor heard any stray stones falling, but it was important to be sure. Akari nods, and then bites her lip, looking inwards down the tunnel. "I'm just not sure about the others. Their eyes were--Mesprit did something."

Ingo makes an affirmative noise, not wishing to consider the image of Emmet or the others blinded further, and says instead, "I suspect it will be on us to locate them. It leaves a foul taste in my mouth, this tendency to prevent those affected from having agency in their fates." 

"I suppose if the Legendaries weren't all kind of like this, we wouldn't be in this position in the first place."

Under Rapidash's firelight, Akari and Ingo start down the narrow alleyway until they reach what Ingo believes to be the far wall of the cave, if the section of standing water that Rapidash tiptoes across is consistent with the array that Ingo recalled from earlier. He hadn't considered it important to remember, naively enough. There the path forks at a T, options leading west or east. 

Ingo doesn’t take long to consider. Two of the missing are children. "I'm fairly certain that Lucas and Iris will be to the west. I may not know the route, but heading as far to the southwest as these tunnels will allow should lead us to Lucas. Iris, I am less certain of."

"This cave wasn't too big," Akari says, reaching for Sneasel beneath Ingo's coat and placing her, wide-eyed, atop Rapidash. Once Sneasel realizes she will not be burned, she occupies herself trying to capture the embers that break of Rapidash's mane. "I think that finding them will only be half the battle. All hands on deck, right?" 

Akari looks at him expectantly, and when Ingo just nods in agreement, she repeats herself. "No, Ingo. All hands on deck, get it?" 

Ah. 

"Akari, that's originally a ship term," Ingo replies, pushing ahead. "My turns of phrase refer to trains." 

She hustles after him, Rapidash and Sneasel in pursuit. "Boo, you're no fun. And what's a train?" 

Ingo picks up pace ever so slightly to mask the flush that heats his cheeks. The path diverges again, and he selects the eastmost option in the interest of the most certain destination. "Professor Laventon explained that trains are large vehicles that carry passengers across long distances using a system of track-and-station networks. What they were to me, I'll have to discuss with Emmet when we resolve this challenge."

From a distance, Akari calls, "You'll have better luck with that if you come this way, then!"

Ingo had, in fact, walked straight into a dead end. 

Pulling his hat over his forehead, he scrubs his hand over his eyes and follows after her. 

After three more turns that Ingo felt certain should have led them in a circle, they find Lucas huddled in the corner scratching at his knuckles, eyes empty still and otherwise showing no sign of hearing their arrival. 

"Lucas?" Akari asks, inching up to him and giving Empoleon a pat on the wing. Lucas does not respond. 

Akari squats in front of him and is silent for a moment, and before she waves Ingo over. Giving the fearful Empoleon a wide berth, he approaches. 

So quietly that Ingo wonders whether he even realizes that he's even speaking, Lucas whispers, "This can't be happening. This isn't real. This isn't real. This isn't real."

Akari glances at Ingo with tears gathering and says, "What do we do?" She folds her hands over Lucas's to stop the picking before he draws blood, but he finches with surprising reactivity given his stupor. 

"I'm fine, I feel fine. Leave me alone!" His voice pitches up into a hoarse yell and he scrambles back further into the corner, Empoleon responding by ducking forward and making a low, indistinct sound in her throat. 

Akari holds fast, hands purple-white with cold and force. "Lucas? Are you there? Can you hear me?" 

"Nothing has changed," He hisses in return, whispering like it's a secret he wants overheard. "This has nothing to do with me. I just need to keep trying, and keep my head down and maybe, and maybe--" With a distressed groan, he tears his cap off and pulls it over his face. He folds inward on himself, landing his forehead on Akari's without seeming to realize, and says, "Maybe it'll all be okay. Then we’ll be together again."

Akari lets go of his hands and flings her arms around his tight, shaking shoulders. "Oh, Lucas. I'm sorry. I'm so sorry, I didn't want to leave you behind," she says, and her hands gather the fabric of his windbreaker like a lifeline. 

Slowly, tentatively, Lucas unravels his hands and wraps them around Akari's waist. Voice impossibly soft again, he says, "I'm scared. I don't want to feel like this."

Rapidash folds her legs and lends her gentle heat to them as Empoleon smooths Lucas's and Akari's messy heads of hair in turn. Akari releases her grip on Lucas's coat and brings her hands to cup his cheeks. Foreheads still pressed together, she says, "I know. It's okay. I'm not going to let you do it alone." 

When she leans her head back to look at him again, his eyes have recovered their gentle brown, and both Akari and Ingo excuse the rings of red around the lower rim. 

With a rough sniffle, Lucas runs his forearm across his eyes and grips onto the tip of Empoleon's wing with the free hand. Once his eyes are clear, he looks to Ingo and Akari and says, a little small still, "You came for me first?" 

"Why wouldn't we?" Ingo assures, pushing himself to his feet by the knees. He offers them a hand each. They grab on in unison and Ingo pulls them up, reaching over to brush the cave grime that had collected in Lucas's white scarf. "We wouldn't risk your safety by needlessly delaying. I do agree we should continue onward to the others. But, first, are you alright to continue?" 

After a few flabbergasted blinks at Ingo, Lucas nods. "Yeah, I think so." To Akari, he adds, "I'm sorry, I still don't remember you, but I… I know you. I'm sorry I said I didn't earlier today. I don't get to remember who you are, but I've felt so lost without you around." 

Akari smiles, not without heartache, and says, "I know. I'm still a little fuzzy myself, but I know I care so much about you, Lucas. I really missed you, too."

The moment, however sweet, is interrupted by a frustrated wail from across the cave. 

Elesa. 

The three share a look and take off northward, Pokemon in tow. 

It's faster, locating Iris. Wrong turns aside, Ingo is skilled at keeping track of where they've been, ensuring that they avoid the walled dead-end as well as the path back to the central hallway. They find her curled up with her Haxorus, and the image strikes Ingo with the memory of her and Drayden giving her an Axew egg to raise alongside her very first, a Deino. She had cried that day, as well, moved by the idea that such a small egg could eventually turn into something as large as her father's Haxorus, which to a nine-year-old was effectively a giant. 

While those tears had been intense, those she cries now stream silent from vacant eyes. Unlike Lucas, she appears to recognize their approach, and says, "Go away." 

Of all the family that Ingo has stumbled upon since returning, Iris has been the hardest to read. She appeared, for the most part, to wear her emotions on her sleeve, but Ingo suspected she also took great care with how and what emotions she conveyed, as well as to whom. This left Ingo unsure of her true feelings, a stark contrast to Drayden and Elesa, who made themselves abundantly clear, and Emmet, whose careful control of his expressions are, somehow, second nature for Ingo to read.

There was no dissonance in Iris here. Her voice was dead and dispassionate, and if there was room for doubt she quashed it by adding, "I don't want to talk to you." 

Akari approaches first. "Iris? Are you--" 

"I can't do anything about it. What does it matter if I'm okay?" She interrupts, and the tunnel fills with the deep resonance of Haxorus's growl. Akari rears back, and Ingo remembers that she had to fight an Alpha Goodra in this same cave, once. 

Ingo overtakes her and stands before Iris at an appropriate distance. Haxorus is only responding to her trainer's emotional state, but Ingo believes that, by respecting her Pokemon's boundaries, he could communicate to Iris that he means well. 

Ingo holds his hand out, palm up, for Haxorus to sniff. Like her trainer, she is still at first, almost frozen in place, before lashing out and slicing at Ingo's fingers with a sharp, cruel tusk. He tears his hand back, hissing in pain and willing himself to ignore the red plume of blood or the kids shouting in alarm behind him. 

As Haxorus raises her leatherback hackles, Iris hiccups softly beneath her. Ingo kneels down before her, aware of how vulnerable he's making himself, but unable to consider the alternative of allowing his cousin to face this on her own. Haxorus’s red eyes and her white meet his at once as he says, "Iris. It matters to me if you're alright. You don't have to blame yourself for feeling."

His fingers bleed onto the cave floor in a steady drip and Iris continues to look through him. He shuffles forward, and adds, "You are allowed to be sad." 

Iris’s still face collapses and Haxorus vanishes in a flash of red. Her entire frame shudders with the force of the sobbing that follows, and Ingo is scrambling on his hands and knees, bleeding be damned, to wrap his arms around her. 

"It's happening again," she wails into her tucked chest, hitching with the effort to catch breaths between sobs and words. "It's not fair , it wasn't supposed to happen again."

Hushing her gently, Ingo rubs circles in her back with his unbloodied hand, like he used to when being Gym Leader and then Champion was too big, too demanding, and Drayden for all his love was no less so. 

He remembers her then, no more than seven, holding his hand and Emmet's as they swung her, stocking legs kicking wild in the air. She asked them if it was going to be like this forever and Emmet had said ' Of course ' with all the surety of someone who couldn't have known what harm such promises could do when broken. Ingo, none the wiser, had insisted that they would always be there for her. 

"No, it wasn't,” he says now, “We promised you that. I'm sorry for breaking my promise, Iris." 

His heart ached with the realization that he didn't know how old she was now, so he didn't know how long he had given her before breaking his word. 

"Ingo, how can having lost someone I can't remember make me so sad?" Iris asks, pushing him back to peer at him with wide brown eyes. 

He hugs her tight again, unable to answer in any meaningful way. She whispers an apology for his hand, which he brushes off but takes as his cue to wrap it up. Iris helps him to his feet and together they tear a strip from the lining on the inside of his Pearl Clan sweater. Akari, perhaps a better field medic than Iris, rushes over to help. Once wrapped and bleeding staunched, Ingo has to spend a full minute allowing Sneasel to investigate the injury before she stops hissing and spitting at Iris, which Iris, thankfully, takes in stride. 

As if on cue, thunder cracks in the distance. 

"No more delaying, huh?" Akari mutters as she leads Rapidash towards the path they came. 

"It appears not."

Elesa leads them to her in bursts of vibrant light and in the charred scars that line the tunnels in the eastward wing. It's clear where not to go, which tracks lead to the husks of dead-ends that Elesa had thrown herself upon. The sight has Lucas returning Empoleon to her pokeball, and Ingo wishes that he had one for Sneasel. 

Though he makes an attempt to direct the kids behind him, they will hear none of it. Lucas and Iris instead remind him that they're the ones carrying teams of Pokemon on hand. 

Ingo wishes it would be as easy as a battle. 

A Pokemon that Iris calls Ampharos spots them first. The warning is milliseconds, a voltaic whine that sends Rapidash rearing onto her back hooves and Ingo shoving the children into the wall as a yellow-white beam blares past, colliding with the far tunnel wall. 

"Elesa, enough!" Ingo shouts, and he can taste the static like metal in the air and feel the hairs on his arms pull toward Ampharos as it discharges. Lucas sends in Tangrowth to absorb the hit, and Ingo spares a moment of eye contact with him to try to convey a need before dashing forward, past Tangrowth's hulking form. 

Lucas is smart. While Ampharos recharges, he has Tangrowth use a power whip to knock it aside, granting Ingo the opportunity to escape past it towards the corner and round it to Elesa. 

She's waiting for him. Sclera-stare somehow still vibrant with rage, she says, "Unless you know the way out, fuck off." 

"I do know the route, but you have to listen to me." 

Hugging her arms over her chest, Elesa pulls herself inwards to shrink away from Ingo. Behind her is another dead-end, scorched in an array like circuit board wiring. Like veins. "No, thanks," she replies, forced casual failing to stick. "I'll figure it out on my own. I've had to for this long."

She waits, because there's no getting past him and around the corner without confrontation. "Elesa--" 

"Don't! Don't even. I don't even know who you are, really, or when or how exactly you left us but," she grabs a fistful of her blouse and throws out her other hand, fingers splaying at her side. There are tears at the corners of her blank eyes. "But I can feel it now, all of these awful years, Ingo. I know nothing but the gap of you in everything, and having to watch someone I love deteriorate under the burden of two people's lives without even knowing.”

Ingo steps forward, but it's clear this is the incorrect response, because her hands fly up like guards in a fistfight. She continues, the defensive posture no detriment to the offensive she's taken here, "And what was I supposed to do? Apparently, nothing, because a god had taken you and all that was left of you with it. Because we're better off, I guess, without knowing, happy and empty and useless."

“It didn’t take everything. You’re here, you’re still you.” 

Behind them a halted burst of white light fizzled out, alongside a careening cry and the soft thump of a fallen Pokemon. 

"You left, Ingo." 

"I know. It wasn’t my intention. I only ever wanted to find my way home.” 

Elesa reaches him in a single stride and her arms are tight around his neck, head buried in the shoulder of his worn coat. "Thank you for coming back," she says, muffled by fabric but somehow exactly as clear as she needs to be. "We need you. We're just missing some of the pieces still." 

The kids round the corner, Akari carrying a fainted Ampharos over her shoulder. Elesa clutches him close, then withdraws, eyes again electric blue, before fumbling with her belt to return Ampharos to its pokeball. Akari buckles with the vanished weight and says, "We really weren't trying to knock it out."

Elesa waves her hand dismissively. "Oh, no, he would have stopped at nothing, taking him out was the right call." Then, with sincerity, "I'm sorry. There's no excuse for putting you all in danger. Pokemon fuckery or not. I hope you can forgive me." 

Akari, Lucas, and Iris are quick to overlook it. A glance passes between Elesa and himself, but Ingo just hums an affirmative. Safety is paramount, but Elesa had been pushed outside of her control and left to suffer. It was not something he'd hold against her. 

Ingo reviews the group for injuries, though Rapidash's firelight wasn't the best to tell. Satisfied there were none to address, his gaze lands on Elesa and he says, "Let's find Emmet." 

Jaw set, Elesa nods. "I didn't find him when I was, you know. But I also couldn't see." Her eyes blow wide, and she says, distraught, "I'd know if I had hurt him right?" 

Ingo's stomach bottoms out. Lucas had been unresponsive at first. Elesa takes silence as an answer, grabs his hand, and breaks into a run. 

Ingo desperately wishes for Chandelure, for some sign of the way beyond turn after turn towards blank, empty walls. The signs of Elesa's rampage recede and with it the scorchmark signals of turns already taken. And Ingo's normal memory for direction is scattered, especially as Rapidash keeps pace with Akari on shorter legs and the dark rushes in to meet them. 

The distant, logical part of Ingo's brain realizes that the absence of marred walls as they press suggests that Emmet and Elesa had not crossed paths. Adrenaline feeds on those logical parts, though, consuming blindly and leaving hollow panic in its wake. 

When they find Emmet, he's pacing in a tight square at the end of a tunnel parallel to the path Akari and Ingo took at the start. The legs of his trousers are soaked through, despite the lack of standing water at this end. Of course Emmet had been wandering the tunnels on different routes while they rushed to find him. 

None of his Pokemon are with him, but Ingo spots their vain, vibrating frustration along Emmet's belt, too well-trained to break free and too concerned to sit quietly and wait. 

Emmet, like Lucas, doesn't acknowledge their approach at first. He tangles his hands in his hair, and, on the far corner turns on his heels, Ingo can see that his mouth moves with words that he can't hear. He knows he should check with Elesa and the others, but Ingo is suddenly a child again, rehearsing in the library the steps that can help his brother, and his legs know what to do. 

Emmet is at once the grown man he met a day ago and the boy Ingo has always known, a palimpsest of the now and the before that's marked by this moment only by void-white eyes. 

Close enough that he needn't raise his voice, Ingo says, "Emmet, it's Ingo. May I come closer?" 

Without stopping, Emmet lifts his head towards the voice, and Ingo can see how his chest pulls up to his throat with gasping inhales that seem to rip across the exhale, rattling his sternum. 

It's another loop, agonizing for Ingo to wait though, before Emmet replies, " Please ," and then he crumbles, wavering back into the tunnel's end and sliding to the floor. Seated, he bounces his foot against the floor and drags in each ragged breath like even breathing is hard won.

Practiced, Ingo joins him, sitting almost shoulder to shoulder with just enough room between them to avoid crowding Emmet. 

As children, Ingo remembers now, he would ask if he could put an arm around and pull Emmet close. Ingo would stay with him for as long as needed, running rehearsed breathing exercises and simple math problems until it passed. It wasn't until Hisui that Ingo had panic attacks of his own, and by then all the tools he had to cope with were lost to him. 

Many were lost here, too, with no chance to leave, no benefit in reviewing the facts when Ingo has no sense of what Emmet is trapped with in his head. The risk of triggering further panic outweighs anything more than trying to help him breathe slow and whole. 

Unbidden, Emmet says with a flat, weary voice, "I could have stopped this. I should have stopped this."

Ingo's breath catches and his chest aches. "It was not your responsibility, and you weren't given the chance." 

"You are my responsibility," Emmet interjects, louder now and wheezing. "I don’t remember, but I know that much. I would have done anything." 

He stares outwards, past the others that have gathered in the corridor, and Ingo wonders if he is speaking to Ingo here and now or the idea of him that resides in the emotions Mesprit had returned. 

Emmet continues before Ingo can think of what to say. "I clearly didn't do enough, if this is what I'm left with."

They're young again, in Ingo's mind, defeated in a multi battle and Emmet's only way of apologizing is insisting that he was a failure, that his hindsight indicates some core deficiency. Ingo, scuffed knees and bruised ego, doesn't know how to explain, then, that losing is only an invitation to try again, to learn and grow and show up better for it the next time. Emmet was usually the crier between the two of them, but Ingo used to always cry when they lost, once he could find a place to hide. 

Ingo cries now, leaning his head back against the cavern wall. Through silent tears he says, "I should have done more to find you sooner."

Laughter bubbles up from Emmet's throat on the peak of a heaving exhale, strained and coarse. "You were the one that was lost. If I had just known, even just this fraction of it, I'd have searched the world for you."

"You would have eventually found that I'd been uncoupled from our time. What then?" 

"I'd do anything not to feel this way. I wouldn't survive days. Years would be out of the question." 

Emmet's breathing heaves then, and their conversation ceases in order for Ingo to coach them through inhale and exhale until they land in careful unison. When Ingo looks back to his brother, Emmet's eyes are gray and glassy, but his, fixedly avoiding Ingo’s. 

As children, they channeled their quirks, and later their grief, into Pokemon training and battling alongside one another. What tools did either of them have to face it alone? 

Ingo understands Elesa's fury better, feeling his own bite at his esophagus like stomach acid. He could be tempted to rage around this cavern cage and leave nothing but rubble in his wake. 

Instead, he says, "I've missed you, Emmet. Even when I couldn't remember, and even when you don't know me." 

Emmet’s tears spill unbidden now, and he nods roughly when Ingo offers his arm to wrap around his shoulders. They sit there for a while, and Ingo is thankful that Rapidash's light is just far enough that he can mask a little of how he weeps.

"I'm sorry, Ingo," Emmet mutters. "I'm sorry that I couldn't help you. I'm sorry that I forgot." 

Ingo holds his brother close and hopes to convey that there's nothing to forgive. In the distance, a portion of the cave begins to quake again, and in the aftermath Ingo can just hear a Starly sing. 

A voice carried on a distant breeze, no more than a whisper, says, "Best of luck, travelers."

Their first trial is complete. 

Chapter Text

The third time Uncle Drayden's face appears on his Xtransceiver, Emmet texts him back. 

'I am Emmet. ' 

Then: 'You must have forgotten. Your daughter has a different xtrans number.'

Finally: 'Call Iris. '

That he accomplishes this without any expletives, Emmet thinks, is worth celebrating. His uncle calls again. 

Emmet taps decline and sets the ringer to silent. Ignoring the throb at the exact center of his forehead, he jerks his head up to return his attention to the others collected on the Lake Verity shoreline. They’ve splintered off into groups again, mostly seated, talking amongst themselves and tending to their unnerved, bewildered Pokemon. Elesa watches him, mouthing “ you okay” when he looks her way, as if she looks any better off with her mascara migrating along her cheekbones. Emmet screws up his brows and wrinkles his nose in a way that communicates that he is working on it. Her half-smile in return suggests she’s doing the same. 

In truth, he doesn't know whether being okay factors. His heart hurts, receding into a dull echo of the agony that wrecked him in that cave. Emmet lost track of exactly how long he spiraled until Ingo found him, and now he clings to the passing seconds just to ensure he doesn't lose count again. Ten minutes, ten seconds ago they piled out of the dark into the disappearing daylight. Nine minutes, 55 seconds ago, Uncle Drayden called him, then again seven minutes, 32 seconds ago. Four minutes, two seconds ago, Lucas's Empoleon ferried him across to the far bank where the others waited in various states of collapse. 

"Emmet?" 

Ingo, his brother, his twin , approaches, but leaves him an arm’s length of personal space. Emmet can almost laugh, the care and conscientiousness profoundly unnecessary when all he can think when he looks at Ingo is how much he wants to hug him and never let go. The irony is palpable, Emmet with these intense, sure emotions without the memories to support them, while Ingo juggles the fragments of their past lives and the responsibility to put them, and Emmet with it, back together. 

His headache pulses, which is rude, sending halos floating around the edges of his vision. Determined not to flinch, he plasters on a tight smile and tries for airy and relieved. "Hello, Ingo! What's wrong?" 

Ingo narrows his eyes, and asks, "Do you have medication for that?" 

Emmet shrinks a little into his shirt but maintains his smile. "Ah, no. This is new.” Emmet considers. "I think it might be you?" 

This, unsurprisingly, is not the thing to say. He shouldn't need a script with his brother, but Emmet's never been great with words. Ingo's face falls, and Emmet wonders if Mesprit will just drown him in the lake if he asks nicely. "I'm sorry. I don't think it's your fault. It is just--" 

"A lot to take in," Ingo finishes, extending a hand to pull Emmet up as his expression softens again. "I can understand that. Still, we should find something to address it. Our next destinations are some ways, and I'd like to not cause you pain if I can help it." He looks past Emmet towards the island and Mesprit's cave. "That is, if you still intend to join us." 

Emmet's grin eases out to something apologetic, because he understands why and still detests that it's even a question Ingo would have to consider asking. He grabs his brother’s waiting hand. "Where else would I go?" 

Hauling him to his feet, Ingo starts to say something before the fastest possible voice drags their attention to Lucas and Akari. Lucas holds his arm out as far as he can stretch it, cell phone facing him with the camera on. Akari leans into the frame over his shoulder, somewhere between startled and ecstatic. 

The voice is saying, "And I'm just freaking out, you know, I have no idea what happened but suddenly I'm bawling my eyes out something wicked and I'm sure, completely totally entirely sure that something is wrong back home. It's not just me, either, Mom is really out of sorts when I call her. I've got this gut feeling that I have to check on my buddy, so here I am, are you good?"

The voice is almost familiar. As Lucas appears to flounder for an adequate, albeit accurate, response, Emmet slinks up behind them to catch a glimpse. Of course, Emmet is far taller than these actual children, and he and the boy on the phone share a moment of recognition that Emmet would rather have avoided. 

"Subway Master Emmet?" The boy, all flyaway blond hair and a blur of orange, clamors. "You kicked my ass, ignored my really good Multi Battle idea, and now you're hanging out with my friend?" 

No help at all, Akari doubles over, wheezing with laughter. Lucas tries his best. "Mr. Emmet is here investigating some strange phenomena at the Lakes on behalf of Professor Rowan. I've been sent to assist." 

Even with Lucas's arm fully extended and through the filter of a phone screen, Emmet can tell that the kid is skeptical. He wracks his brain for a name, remembering instead the train car jolting underneath Snorlax's earthquake and the way that the windows smogged up under Infernape's blaze. 

"That sounds fun!" The kid says, and Lucas swallows hard. "You said you're going to the lakes? I can tell you're at Verity, and I'll be flying in through Veilstone! I'll meet you on the way! Don't be late, I'll fine you--wait, does the old man even pay you? Oh man, hadn't thought of that! No fines, I'll just call you until you tell me where I can find you with Staraptor." He pauses for breath, miraculously. "Okay, bye Lucas!" 

Lucas slowly pockets his phone and then buries his head in his hands. "He's so much. It's been such a long day and he's so much."

"Emmet," Akari says while patting Lucas on the back, sing-song voice an omen. "Did Barry say that you beat him?" 

Ah, his name was Barry. This time, Emmet will definitely remember. Tilting his head, he replies, "I did. Why?" 

"Cool! Just asking." 

Emmet loves questions that carry challenges underneath. He pockets that excitement for later and returns to his Xtransceiver, now with twelve new messages from his uncle. Briefly allowing a flare of resentment towards the individual responsible for the device's waterproof design, he forgoes tossing it into the lake and flips open the dual screen. 

His uncle had, in fact, called Iris, who had also ignored him with the exception of one out-of-focus selfie from the shoreline with the group in the in-focus background. Beneath a handful of apologies, Uncle Drayden explained his intentions to investigate something in Opelucid based on their conversation with Rowan, and requested that one of them please answer their phone at some point and explain what had happened. 

Based on what Emmet caught of Barry's tirade, it seems that the trial freed all the stolen emotions, rather than just those belonging to those who accompanied Ingo and Akari. He hoped that his ridiculous, reckless uncle hadn't tried to fly Salamence all the way to Unova, only to be hit with emotional whiplash mid-flight and plummet into the ocean miles from land. The small bit of satisfaction at Uncle Drayden storming away hours before getting his answers didn't mean that Emmet wanted to see him hurt. 

The calls and texting, Emmet supposed, were probably a sign that he was fine, though. He was likely flying upgraded seats with the in-flight wifi pre-purchased, complete with Kalos's finest vintage. There were worse places to feel years of loss in an instant, like, perhaps, circling blind in a cavern under the weight of the certainty that you should have done something, anything, if you had only remembered.

Anyways. 

Emmet texts his uncle back, confirming their wellbeing, adding a note about Mesprit, and stating that he and Iris would call tomorrow, after a night's sleep. He moves to snap the screen shut, before deciding to add one more detail.

'He is my twin brother. I missed him.' 

Ellipses appear and curiosity keeps Emmet fixated on the tiny, blue-light sheen. 

'I was wrong.'

Then: 'We'll discuss tomorrow.'

It wasn't as if his uncle was unable to acknowledge his faults and mistakes. Hard pressed, Emmet would concede that Uncle Drayden was far better than him at admitting defeat. Still, anxiety clawed at Emmet's gut, because it wasn't his disdain for Ingo that sent him running from the Professor's lab earlier today. He wasn't a stranger to how frustration contorted his uncle's face, and the way he paled and crumbled hadn't been anger. 

That would be a conversation for later. 

For now, the sun threatens to slip behind the western treeline and Emmet needs to sleep. Collecting the group, hoisting Akari back up to her feet, gently nudging Elesa's back, swinging Iris in a little pirouette, he guides them towards the forest path back to Route 201 and, beyond it, Sandgem town. 

Ingo joins him at the front of the group, and together they set course for Jubilife via Rowan's lab. 

That night, they gather on the floor of Ingo's and Akari's hotel room with the beds pushed up against the far wall, boxes and trays of takeaway strewn across the floor atop the paper towel and napkin carpet Ingo carefully laid out when the food arrived. In the middle of the mess of them is a map of Sinnoh, courtesy of Lucas, which Elesa has defaced with three stray chopsticks, one stuck straight in each of the region's major lakes. 

In the bottom left corner, Iris draws a little picture of Mesprit and then strikes it out with a fat X. Ingo promises to buy Lucas a new map, although with what money, Emmet is unsure. 

They form a tight circle, Emmet beside Lucas beside Iris. Elesa set up next to Ingo immediately, her proximity presumably her best way of expressing her change of heart. Akari sits between the two groups, holding her pokeballs in her lap despite the hotel’s insistence that they would be best cared for in the specially provided facilities on the first floor. 

Inhaling the last of his soup curry, Emmet flicks the northmost chopstick marker and says, "We should set course for Acuity next. I would like my memories back." He turns to Ingo, who is tearing bits off a roasted sweet potato to feed to Sneasel, occasionally wincing as she pulls at the injury on his left hand in her struggles to free herself to have at the other food. "You lived in the same area in Hisui? The Professor mentioned it wasn't particularly hospitable." 

Lucas answers first, scooting forward to point to the routes connecting Mount Coronet with Lake Acuity, "Since Snowpoint City is on the Gym Challenge circuit, it's usually fairly popular with skiers and skilled trainers. But once you get close to Acuity, it's effectively wilderness. I wonder if it's much changed from what you knew, Mr. Ingo?"

Ingo scratches Sneasel's ear fondly, eyes distant, then says, "There will be some differences, I suspect, but I imagine I'll still recognize the route to the Lake." He blinks, returning to attention, and studies the map. "Are you sure this is wise? To start with Lake Acuity?" 

Elesa hums, and dips closer to the Ingo to try and see what he looks at. "What do you mean? Other than the cold, which I'm sure will be absolutely miserable, doesn't it make sense to head towards something we understand more about?" 

She pulls back and, glancing at Ingo's hand, holds out hers and relieves him of Sneasel, who delights in the trails of her braids until she gets a long claw stuck at the end of one. Elesa isn't paying attention to, or has chosen to steadfastly ignore, her distress, and instead uses her free hand to trace from Jubilife to Lake Valor with a clean chopstick. "And are you absolutely certain we can't fly, Lucas? Iris?" 

Iris says, "I've never traveled Sinnoh before. It was one thing to go from the Windworks back here, to fly out to the lakes I'd need to get a permit or be registered with the League. That could take ages. Even if we flew with Lucas's or the Professor's registered Pokemon, we'd all have to fly on separate ones." Lucas shrugs helplessly.

Elesa huffs, places Sneasel in her lap with a stern glare to insist she stays put, and falls back on her hands, looking at the roof. "Like old times, right Emmet? Skyla always laughed at us for not using flying types," she says, lolling her head onto her shoulder to look at Ingo. "So walking it is then. So, why not start with Acuity? It looks closer."

With Elesa in charge of Sneasel, Ingo had dived wholeheartedly into the meal. He pauses mid-chew when addressed, blinks, and holds up his hand for a moment to catch up. "I think for the exact reason you've suggested we go to Lake Acuity next, I suspect we should consider Lake Valor. What we don't understand may derail us if we fail to consider it." He drinks from his bowl in another bid to consider, and continues, "Though I am in favor of restoring your memories as soon as possible, as well." 

Akari and Lucas rush to talk over each other on the response, Akari raising something about Azelf and Lucas something about Lake Valor. They muddle further, attempting to give each other the opportunity to speak first, leading Emmet to point at his nearest--Lucas--to explain himself. 

"Oh! Um," Lucas starts strong. "I have a theory about that. Lake Valor and Azelf, that is. You all remember how Professor Rowan said it wasn't until Akari withdrew Torterra, Froslass, and Rapidash that they occurred to him as Pokemon under his care?" He waits until a few nods pass the circle, and then fishes in his pocket for his phone. As he prods at the screen, he continues, "I think that's Azelf. Not that we didn't remember that the Pokemon belonged to Akari, that's Uxie and memory. But the oversight? Willpower." His finger freezes as his eyebrows jump, and he twists his hand to face the screen towards Emmet and Iris. 

The phone shows a screenshot of an incoming call, the name 'Barry' across the top in all caps superimposed over a photograph of the same boy Emmet battled in the subway with one arm thrust forward with a peace sign and the other thrown around the shoulders of Akari. She's younger, wearing a modern red peacoat instead of her kimono, and Barry's arm had clearly just landed, so the photo captures her mid-stumble and blurs slightly with motion. But it's her. A Turtwig is at her feet, caught blinking. 

"Barry calls me at least once a week. I've never once seen or thought about Akari in the picture. Not until he called me today. It was like she wasn't even there until now."

Ingo and Elesa scramble around the map as Lucas rounds his arm toward them, Sneasel lurching forward with Elesa and mimicking their wide-eyed stare. 

Lucas shows Akari last, chewing at his lip. "I've been thinking about it all evening, but as soon as you left to go grab the take out downstairs, it was like I couldn't hold onto the thought without really trying."

Akari stares long at the picture and says, "Willpower, huh?" 

In the short time he's known her, Emmet has seen the range of Akari's expressions, a testament to how absurd and demanding this past day had been. Now, as she looks from the picture of her, years younger, to her anxious, apologetic friend, Emmet thinks this is the first time he's seen her utterly exhausted. 

"So," she starts, sitting back on her heels and grabbing a couple trays of dumplings. "Azelf's challenge in Hisui was about determination. Being honest, that's not something any of you lack." Passing one of the trays to Lucas with a little tilt that reminds Emmet of Elesa on their stolen lunch breaks, Akari considers the map before continuing. "So I was thinking that Azelf is a preventative measure. Evidence of us exists, like my Pokemon and that photo. Azelf took--is taking--the part of you that sees that evidence and knows something is wrong. To keep you from looking for what you lost." 

They sit with that, for a moment. Emmet's stomach sours, his meal suddenly too heavy and the residual miasma of cooling broths and standing soy sauce at once too much. Bringing his hands to his knees, he clutches tight until his nails exert their pressure through the thin fabric of his trousers. The brutal, futile panic from Verity Cave claws back, but he latches onto the thought of his brother breathing alongside him like they'd done this a thousand times before.

As they probably had. 

Inhale. Exhale. Repeat. He swallows hard, throat burning. 

His head clears, just enough, and somehow he's still the first to break the silence. "I’ve been looking past evidence of Ingo at home? At work? All this time?" 

Akari winces. "Maybe. You have his Pokemon, right?" 

Ingo starts to backpedal, something about being uncertain about his claim to any of Emmet's team, but Elesa interjects. "Emmet. Ingo. Come here." 

Her voice is low and rough, and she's circled around Emmet to lean over Iris's shoulder, watching something on her Xtransceiver. Left behind in her apparent rush, Sneasel is already upside down in the condiments bag, but neither Emmet nor Ingo intervene as they cross over to Iris.

On the dual screen, Iris has pulled up a video titled 'Multi Battle Against Subway Masters'. It’s five years old. The Xtransceiver doesn't lend itself towards detail when streaming videos, especially on hotel internet, but Emmet knows exactly what he's looking at. 

On a Battle Subway train, the Yellow Line service from Gear Station, he and Ingo battle a pair of trainers, together. Elesa reaches over Iris to drag the video back a couple minutes, and Emmet watches as he and his brother pose in tandem and release Excadrill and Haxorus to face the trainers' Cryogonal and Scrafty. 

It's a quick battle. They win, Pokemon in perfect sync. Though the video has no sound, Emmet watches himself address the defeated challengers with confidence as he points at Ingo, and Ingo follows suit with practiced ease. The train races on, handshakes and words exchanged, until Ingo directs them to seats as the station approaches. The video ends. 

Emmet looks to Ingo, his tattered Nimbasa Subway Uniform in the style issued to conductors, and finally gives in. Almost toppling them both in his rush of excitement, Emmet gathers Ingo in his arms and hugs him as tight as he can manage. It makes his head throb and pushes the air from his lungs, but he's lightheaded and breathless already, so he lifts his brother off the ground and beams into his worn, old Nimbasa City Subway coat. 

"We battled together, Ingo," He breathes, and of course they did. How could they not? But the idea of it makes him giddy, uncontained, because even if his feelings, his memories and his will were taken, he could battle with his brother again soon. He needs no context, no life before, the battle last night enough for him to know these emotions for what they are. It’s the closest Emmet can get to memory, and he wants to feel this endlessly. It’s incredible to feel so sure. 

But, for now, Ingo is heavy. 

Setting Ingo down, he holds the stolen hug a moment longer and then lets go with a measured step back, careful to avoid the map and its arrayed barrier of takeout containers. Ingo's watching him with wide eyes that shine as vibrant as Emmet feels. 

"I'd like to again, someday," Ingo says, and Emmet isn't sure what he's meant to do with the elation that coincides with the surge of rage and heartbreak at the notion that they ever had to stop. 

Emmet settles with a short affirmative, a toothy grin, and swings back towards the others. "We need a destination. I would rather set a course direct to Lake Acuity. If Azelf would be an impediment to our track in any way, we should sidetrack to Valor. Thoughts?" 

Lucas raises his hand. "I'd like to call Professor Rowan in the morning and see what he thinks. Miss Elesa is right that it'd be closer to Lake Acuity, so I think we should be closer to sure before we decide." 

Stifling a groan at the idea of delaying a decision, Emmet nods a grudging concurrence. Beside him, Iris says, "Maybe we should ask Dad, too? Since we're calling him tomorrow morning anyway. I think he's researched the Sinnoh myths before"

Emmet agrees, if only because it would steer the conversation with his uncle in the morning. 

Decided, they clear the takeout and rearrange the room back into the hotel's intended layout, or some semblance of it. Before rolling up the defaced map, Ingo takes a moment to confirm that, regardless of their choice, Oreburgh City at the foot of Mount Coronet is their next stop. 

With the room rearranged, cleaned, and Sneasel extricated from her sauce packet hoard, Emmet and the others depart for their own rooms. Elesa ordered a cot up to theirs, so that Iris wouldn’t have to stay alone. Uncle Drayden can afford the empty hotel room, after all. Iris’s excitement, earlier, about movies they could watch together and other such activities, gives way to absolute exhaustion as she collapses face first onto the little bed. Emmet is inclined to follow, but Verity’s grime sticks to his skin and his breath tastes like cumin, vinegar, and stomach acid. 

Eight minutes, 43 seconds pass and then Emmet is lost. Not entirely, not like before, where the void would open beneath him and hollow him out in the endless, empty fall. But the face in the back-lit bathroom mirror is and is not his own, and something in his lungs uncoils so that the next, fuller inhales fill him like a vacuum has opened up inside of him, the yawning maw of forgetting. The persistent pounding at the front of his skull eases, finally, but the emotions stay. Grief and fear, anger and confusion, all of the years of it are branded on him, embedded to the bone. Its excess, untethered now without a cause to catch hold to, threatens to swallow him whole. 

He slams the flat of his palm on the light switch, hitting mostly wall but achieving dark relief. Inhale, exhale, repeat, and then Emmet is marching out the door to the hallway, ignoring Elesa's and Iris's calls after him. Halfway back to his brother, he runs into Lucas, supposed to be home in Sandgem by now, and the understanding that passes between them is unspoken as they round the corner to the room they're searching for. 

When Akari opens the door, flashes of surprise and concern settle on expectation, and Emmet says, abruptly breathless, "Lake Valor. We will go to Lake Valor first."

"We're really in it now aren't we, Ingo?" 

Emmet and Ingo walk the subway tunnels beneath Nimbasa City under Chandelure's ambient, flickering glow. Tonight Emmet dreams weightless without grief, and this terrifies him. 

The tunnel stretches endlessly in either direction with no service stop in sight. Ingo's coat is old and torn, and his hand is bleeding in an steady trickle onto the tracks beneath them. He simply says, "We are," because this version of Ingo is always succinct. It's one of his many tells, how Emmet learned back when the line between sleep and waking wasn't so clear and he needed to realize again and again that Ingo hadn’t come home. 

In the direction they came from, someone is shouting, screaming, their voice echoing off the subway walls and distorting into amorphous wails of agony that tip high-low, high-low as if giving chase towards them. Emmet grabs Ingo's bloody hand and the walls unfold to reveal converging lines at the train maintenance depot on the city outskirts. It's night, but the lights off the approach signals coalesce with the effusive layer of winter fog, bathing the tracks in red and green and yellow. 

His hand is red, ruddy and dry, with Ingo's blood but Ingo is not here. The spike of panic is distant at first, but then hurtles at him like an impending accident. Emmet watches outside of himself like a hapless bystander as dread bowls over him, leaving him crouching with his head in his hands in the middle of the rail. 

Emmet has not been alone since the beginning. Not here, where his mind conjures up the idea of Ingo to keep him company, or to keep him sane. 

The fog grows thick and chokes him, cutting all light but the one malfunctioning go-signal that leaves his world green reflecting from gray. Grief seeps in, pinning him to the sleepers. It was never so heavy before, when the reality of loss was the requirement of sleep and welcomed him like his uniform, tailored and worn in. Now it was the fog in the air, but solid and stinking like smoke, forcing his head to bow low and pressing him into the earth until the rail joints slice his trousers and tear open his hands and knees. 

Awake, Emmet could focus on his recovered emotions, the affection for his brother, the exhilaration at having a battle partner and rival, the fondness and excitement unraveling in each new moment. The pain was undercurrent, a derivative to be dealt with, however poorly Emmet managed to actually do so. 

What else was there, here where he could remember? Certainly the joy of finding Ingo again, of setting a course towards rebuilding their lives, but whether it was Mesprit's parting gift or his own poisoned psyche, Emmet cannot latch onto these genuine blessings in any way that matters. 

Ingo had been flung, for no discernable reason, centuries into the past and would have been left to die there had it not been for Akari, a child herself abandoned to history. Emmet would have never found him, not even with his memories, his emotions, or his willpower in place. None of it would have mattered, no matter what the blind grief from Verity’s trial led him to believe. 

In those two days between, before the void took what was left of Ingo, Emmet sought out the truth. He wonders for the first time in four years, five months, and 18 nights what he would have done with the truth once he had found it. 

On the platforms at Gear Station, the Green Line train hurls past, not taking passengers. Across the tracks, Ingo waits on Platform 2 for the train out of Nimbasa City. Emmet is suddenly on his feet, tearing forward, past the yellow bar that demarcated where waiting passengers do and do not belong, until the toes of his boots line perfectly with the edge of the platform. 

"Don't leave," he breathes and it comes out a scream. 

Ingo turns away from his watch down the tunnel, and when he looks at Emmet, he's smiling softly. His voice carries easily across the tracks. "I'll be there when you wake up." 

Emmet digs his shredded, wet fingers into his white shirt and shouts, "But I won't be!" 

The Green Line train runs down the tunnel on Emmet's side, not stopping for passengers, and if Ingo replies the thrumming, even-beat rush of metal and wind drowns him out. 

The lights at the edge of Ingo's platform begin to flash. Emmet tries another angle. "Where are you going?" 

"Back." He’s younger then, uniform clean, posture tall with ease. The advertisements plastered to the wall behind him are an endless stretch of moments, their childhood to the day Ingo vanished unspooled into infinite freeze frames until--

Twin beams of white-yellow light peer around the bend with hunter's eyes. The train approaches like wildfire and Emmet is running out of time. 

"Take me with you." 

Their eyes meet as the lead car throws itself past. Ingo is gone when the train pulls away.

Oreburgh City is a short hike from Jubilife, made slightly longer by the fresh snow that blankets Route 203. Mid-morning sunshine offers fragile warmth as they trudge single file down the path that Chandelure and Rapidash melt for them. Sneasel, more at home in this weather, barrels ahead to slide across the frozen pond at the northeast edge of the trail. Akari's Froslass keeps close watch on Sneasel and terrorizes a lone trainer that entertains the idea that either Pokemon might be a fair catch. 

Uncle Drayden calls them about halfway through Oreburgh Gate, forcing Emmet to sprint forward into town to assure his uncle that, no, he's not ignoring his calls again, but underground reception doesn't make for a productive conversation. Akari, Lucas, and Elesa opt to go shopping for provisions while Emmet, Iris and Ingo settle in the Oreburgh Pokemon Center second floor to return the call. 

Ingo offers, twice, to excuse himself from the conversation, but neither Emmet nor Iris will hear it. They sit around a table as Emmet pops his Xtransceiver onto the surface, folding the band underneath so that it stands with the dual screen facing them. A quick glance to his brother and cousin, and Emmet slides open his contacts and taps his uncle's name. 

Uncle Drayden answers immediately. Emmet isn't certain his call finished ringing once. Lit by an old glass-shade lamp, he sits at his massive desk in Opelucid with his hands folded and his eyes heavy. It's late in Unova, the overnight flight notwithstanding, and his uncle carries weariness with his back rolled forward and in his lack of something immediate to say. Emmet doesn't volunteer to open the conversation, so Iris is the first to speak. "Long flight, huh?" 

Underneath his ridiculous beard, Uncle Drayden smiles. It's minute, buried beneath no shortage of facial hair, but there, and Emmet mentally thanks Iris for breaking the silence. 

"It was," he confirms, expression then sliding back to serious. "You're all alright?" 

In lieu of answering, they each nod, which is apparently enough. His uncle continues. "Thank you for the photo, Iris. It was good to see you were all okay after yesterday, and it helped confirm some things."

Emmet recalls the terrible picture that Iris sent to her father out of, mostly, spite, herself entirely out of focus, the angle off-kilter enough to capture the group spread across Verity Lakefront. How had that helped anything? 

"But first, I should apologize for my behavior. Both how I left and how I have treated Ingo."

 Ingo visibly diminishes, already clearing his throat to fend off the apology and find some way to insist that he is the one at fault. Uncle Drayden holds up a hand, stopping Ingo in his tracks. "I fear there's a longer conversation to be had about all of this. None of you need to accept my apology, or even consider it necessary or wanted, but it needs to be said."

Iris hums, and says, "I appreciate that, and agree, but what I really want to know is why it was so important that you left immediately. I chased you down, Dad, and you still went home." 

Uncle Drayden frowns, and then reaches for something out of frame. Emmet passes through surprise, dismay, and finally to exasperation when it turns out to be a book, something clearly out of an academic library. It's old enough that Emmet can't make out the title embossed on the cover, and has to wait patiently for his uncle to finish collecting items for an explanation.

 Beside the book, Uncle Drayden lays out a stack of sleek papers, a dusty wallet, and an Xtransceiver screen with its band shorn off at a clean line right above the clasp. 

"It's worth mentioning," his uncle starts slowly, and despite the barrier of the screen Emmer can tell his attention has shifted to him, "that my house has many photos of Ingo. Alongside you, Emmet. With your parents. With Iris and myself. Though I suspect based on your text yesterday evening that this ground has already been covered." 

That's certainly one way to admit to recovering a long-lost nephew, but Emmet doesn't comment. He does catch on to the point earlier, though, and says, "Iris's picture helped you keep on course once you left."

"Without it, I had to reckon with the sudden onset of certainty that I had lost one of you. I had nothing to go on until I got this picture. I couldn't even grasp what I was flying home to find, which had become distinctly less important underneath the wave of emotions I had no context for.” He pauses, and then sighs. “Thank you, Emmet, for the details about Lake Verity.”

Voice small, Iris says, "Sorry for not answering my phone." 

He shakes his head. "I wouldn't have been in the right state of mind to make sense of what was going on." Laying his hands flat on the desk, he clears his throat for effect, and moves on. No more emotional vulnerability for the day, evidently. "My acquaintance with Professor Rowan was initiated by myself, several years ago, during a period where the Legendary Pokemon of Sinnoh greatly interested me. It was his comments about Akari's Torterra that reminded me I had effectively dropped contact with him as quickly as I had engaged him on my questions, as if I had simply forgotten that I had once cared."

He takes the stack of papers in his hands and slides on his reading glasses. "I printed these this morning, but they're dated four and a half years ago. Emmet, I'll forward them to you. It's easier to read them, I think."

So he does. The notification flashes on the screen, one of 32 unread emails, and Emmet drags it open so that his uncle's face shrinks to the corner of the screen. The text reads:

Dear Professor Rowan, 

I hope this email finds you well and at an opportune moment. I apologize for the forthcoming lack of formality. I am Drayden, Gym Leader of Opelucid City in Unova and I have an urgent request for information. 

My nephew has gone suddenly missing in the subway tunnels of Nimbasa City, also Unova. The investigation is ongoing and my suspicions may turn out entirely incorrect, but after recent events in our region, many among the League have been keeping close watch on activities indicative of Legendary Pokemon and those that wish to control them.

In the location where my nephew's effects and Pokemon were recovered, I recognized a number of patterned scars or marks burnt into walls and roof, photos attached, which match up with powers of time-space distortion beyond those of the known entities in Unova. My limited research pointed me to Sinnoh, and then you. 

What can you tell me about Dialga, Palkia, and Giratina?

Best regards, 

Drayden of Opelucid City

Uncle Drayden waits for them to finish. Emmet is glad that he can read through it fast, because it takes at least three scans for his brain to catch on to the implications. "We didn't immediately forget?" 

Iris taps the minimized window of her father's face so that it reclaims the screen as he says, "It appears we had two days." 

Before Emmet can let that settle, Ingo whispers, almost to himself, "To remove the consequence, the Lake Spirits were called to ensure that the absence of the chosen was unproblematic."

 Except, Ingo isn't particularly good at whispering. Uncle Drayden's line goes silent while Iris and Emmet turn to stare. There's a mutual quiet where it seems that Ingo is going to force someone to ask him to clarify whatever that was, but then he says, "Something Arceus said when explaining the conditions we were returning to, about the consequences of removing us from our times. I thought little of it then, since the rest was more distracting. But perhaps it was less a careless oversight on Arceus's part, which strikes me as unlikely, but something unanticipated?"

Taking his nephew's casual reference to a conversation with a God of Creation in stride with nigh more than raised eyebrows, Uncle Drayden says, "Perhaps. That brings me to this." He lifts up the aged book, at which point Emmet realizes with disappointment that it's one of his texts on the mythology of Unova. Until, that is, he opens to the approximate middle to reveal the edges of pages, ragged, where they were torn out. Obscuring his face, he holds up to the screen a single card with a Xtransceiver number written in Emmet's own terrible handwriting. "I wasn't the only one searching untrodden paths. Although I would appreciate warning before wanton destruction of my books in the future, Emmet." 

The conversation meanders from there. Emmet claims amnesia as his defense on the counts of violence against his uncle's library, though hard pressed he'd do it again. None of them recognize the number, and a quick text to Elesa confirms that it's not in her contacts either. They even plug in the decapitated Xtransceiver, Ingo's once, and it's neither Ingo’s old number nor listed among his contacts.

Iris votes they call it immediately, while Uncle Drayden and Ingo agree to hold off. Emmet is sorely tempted, but couldn’t permit it if there's any chance that this would divert from the destination ahead. Were they not already routed toward their memories, the temptation would be unbearable. But Ingo was here, home, and whatever lead that Emmet once thought this was could be a diversion and a waste. 

Uncle Drayden confirms that he'll be staying in Opelucid City, foremost to manage the Gym, but also to prepare for people's memories to return. After explaining further the nature of the Lake Spirits, Iris asks his opinion on their direction. He agrees with their plan to proceed to Lake Valor first, if only because he wanted time to inform the League what was coming. The intervention on human memory on such a scale, even if most Unovans were familiar with Ingo only in passing, was not insignificant. 

Not one of them could argue with that, although Iris certainly tried. They said goodbyes after his uncle extracted a promise for regular updates, at least every other day. As he hangs up, Uncle Drayden waves the wallet, the last item he had laid out on the desk, in his hand and says, “Until next time, Subway Masters Ingo and Emmet.” 

Emmet commits Ingo’s small answering smile to memory. 

Elesa, Akari, and Lucas greet them outside the Pokemon Center with coffee and an array of shopping bags. Sneasel, who accompanied the others on the promise of having a say in food selection, has taken to Lucas and sleeps atop his hat. Akari, unburdened with coffees or Sneasel, is free to bound up to them, and asks, "How'd it go?" 

Ingo reaches to alleviate her of a number of the shopping bags and leaves the answer at a nod. Uncertain of how to broach the subject of Ingo's disappearance and the two missing days afterwards, Emmet follows his lead. Akari gives them a long look, but doesn't press. 

Besides supplies for themselves and their Pokemon, including a bottle of painkiller pressed quickly into Emmet’s hand, Elesa had insisted they purchase clothing appropriate for the winter the Unovans hadn't prepared for and the era the Hisuians found themselves in. Ingo would not part with the jacket or hat, but agreed that preserving his Clan sweater from further wear was worthwhile. Elesa, for her part, anticipated this and bought only one men's jacket, in white. 

Once outfitted, packed, and caffeinated, they set out. At the edge of Route 207, Coronet looming to the east, Emmet presents five pokeballs to Ingo. "Safety first! You need a team in case we are separated. I happen to know some Pokemon that would be honored to fight by your side."

Chandelure releases herself on the spot, spinning in tight circles around Ingo's frame with delighted bellsong. Ingo's voice is thick as he replies, locking the pokeballs to the belt that Elesa knowingly provided, "It would be my honor, I think."

Chandelure's burst of heatless flame conveys her opinions about that, sending purple and blue glimmer reflecting off the icy top of the sheet of snow. Emmet is confident of who among his team belongs to Ingo, though their Trainer IDs were of little help determining it. The videos reviewed over the hotel breakfast showed that the two of them were wont to switch Pokemon between one another by the day. It was easier to ask when he gathered his team for their own breakfast, as the Pokemon, after all, still remember their trainer. 

Not one seemed disinterested in traveling with Ingo, which Emmet could empathize with, but Haxorus, Garbodor, Crustle, Excadrill and, of course, Chandelure were the most insistent. With one slot remaining for Sneasel, Ingo has a team proper, and Emmet’s saved from beleaguered looks at the Pokemon Center and Iris's commentary. 

It feels right. 

Emmet pats Chandelure on the glass, scratches Sneasel at the fold behind her ear feather, and closes by placing a hand on his brother's shoulder. With a soft exhale, he relaxes his smile. 

"They are very lucky to have you back." He then jerks his head to the left, where the others are ascending the stairway to the cliffs at Coronet's foot, forcing his mind to forge ahead. 

"Everything's ready, then. All aboard!”

Ingo's eyes follow the gesture, and then his gaze tracks up Mount Coronet with a subtle squint and dip of his brows. It's gone as soon as it appears, his expression back to what Emmet understands as Ingo's neutral frown and stern eyes. Emmet allows himself a glance to the mountaintop, a location they have no business at, before hooking his arm in his brother's and leading him forward to where the others wait. 

Their route takes them through a cave system within Coronet whose winding caverns Ingo navigates with expertise. Snowmelt has the cave floor sleek with the overflow from the subterranean pools that hug the worn, cascading walls, making Emmet glad for his new boots. The rough staircase cut into the slope that they use the bypass the risk of ice receives a scathing review from Ingo in terms of safety and state of repair, leading Akari to recount a story about Ingo's role making Coronet's many passages safe for travelers. 

Emmet is suddenly warm in the winter dark beneath the mountain, light at the notion of Ingo carrying on the subway's work regardless of the distance and amnesia. 

As Chandelure lights the way, they make short work of the cavern while pressing Akari and Ingo for more about their time in Hisui. Ingo steers the conversation towards the Pokemon called Sneasler, evidently an evolution of his Sneasel variant, to include the detail that it would carry Ingo and others up mountains on its back. In a basket. 

Emmet considers the sheer bluffs and remains of rock slides on the mountainside that they've climbed inside. Emmet considers Sneasel, small enough to curl up on top of Ingo's hat with a personality that’s, in a word, impulsive. He says, "That explains the state of your coat."

Ingo gives him a long-suffering look that Emmet is certain was once a fixture of their relationship. Emmet continues, "How does one complete safety checks on an oversized Sneasel?" 

Akari chimes in with "Asking nicely and hoping for the best!" Ingo leaps to the defense of the Lady Sneasler, the energy with which he makes the case rousing Sneasel and proving distracting even to Chandelure, who phases closer to the group to add high and low trills as emphases to Ingo's points. 

The cave path brightens with the echoes of voices and laughter, sending a hanging colony of Zubat fluttering from above them to the far, darker corners. Otherwise, the few wild Pokemon about, mostly Geodude and Machop, pay them no mind. Ingo leads them around any he notices with a wide berth, nonetheless.

The light that puddles at the cavern’s exit is no warning for the full bloom of late afternoon sun, reflecting hazy off waterfall mists, as they emerge onto Route 208. The skies have cleared, and the flood of warmth that reaches Emmet after passing through the wind tunneling at the passage is an immense relief.

The landing gives way to a log bridge over rapids below, rushing with the increased flow from the night's snowfall. Though the crossing is wide enough for several across, Ingo and Emmet conduct the group through in pairs, pausing at the central spire to marvel at the falls spilling off the cliffside. Unprompted and unexplained, Akari and Iris jog up to a hiker resting nearby and soon enough he is preparing to take a photo of them on Lucas's phone. The girls nudge them into the frame, Elesa between Ingo and Emmet and the three kids lined up in front. 

Elesa looks at them both, shrugs, and throws an arm each around their shoulders. Ingo startles, sending Elesa stumbling sideways, and the impromptu photographer chuckles at the presumably failed picture. She goes to pull away, but Ingo looks at her with a fumbled apology and eyes that plead don't give up on me. 

What Ingo doesn't realize, doesn't remember yet , is that Elesa doesn't know how to give up. She beams, pulls him back in, and holds them close. Emmet floats in the familiarity, needing no memories to know that this is home to him. Their Pokemon gather around, the kids count down from three, and after a beat the hiker gives them a big thumbs up. 

After Lucas collects his phone, they proceed across the second bridge to see Hearthome City climb onto the horizon. Emmet tosses a glance to the almost-sunset behind him, then back to the city ahead. With good time, they'll make it to Valor tomorrow. Whatever awaits there, whatever Azelf has in store, Emmet is certain that if a challenge of determination awaits, he's ready for it.

Chapter Text

Hearthome City's manicured streets follow orderly lines around flagstone pathways punctuated with delicate topiary and globe lamps that switch on moments after they enter at the gate. While the framework of Jubilife City evoked the streets and structures that Ingo once knew, Hearthome held no such resemblances to Hisui. Drenched orange in evening light, the city is as beautiful as it is precise and elegant, and it strikes Ingo unexpectedly that he yearns for streets more chaotic, more alive, in a city so large. 

At a neatly paved park underneath a pruned tree canopy, the group reaches an impasse. They've stopped at the south end of town to rest their legs, eat a meal, and set a path forward, theoretically in that order. Emmet, however, paces in long strides beside a marble-cut fountain, waving his unopened lemon cake meal bar in sharp, emphatic arcs as he insists they push ahead tonight. 

Elesa, the opposition, says, "Route 212 is pretty long. We'd be hiking into the night to get to Pastoria."

"Half of the route is a garden. It'd be very quick," Emmet counters as he spins on his heel to repeat his circuit. 

Elesa slides down the bench with a groan, hinging her back on the edge of the seat. "That doesn't negate the portion that's a swamp, Emmet." 

Emmet stops and swings his arm to point at her, startling a poorly timed evening jogger that falls in the gesture's path. Ingo watches Emmet’s fluster manifest as a bright smile and an apology too quick to be entirely polite, and sits in the warmth that spreads in his chest as Elesa waits a beat for the jogger to run off before breaking into a fit of laughter. Iris comments that people in Unova travel miles to Nimbasa City and fight in the subways for hours to get pointed at like that, leading her and Akari into a bout of affectionate imitation. 

Akari takes to the long sweeps of the arm and the sudden flicks of the wrist like a natural, no doubt thanks to the hundreds of hours dedicated to perfecting her capture form in the Hisuian wilds. Iris is more languid, the timing of her eyes-to-hand imprecise, which for the sake of Pokemon battles would be no issue. But, the dramatic effect is secondary to function, these gestures necessary to ensure one performs safety checks and conducting tasks consciously, reducing the risk of error. 

Oh? 

Ingo sits up with a sputter, drawing the attention of the others and stopping the girls mid-point. Sneasel chirps from his lap, and Emmet mirrors her confusion with a tilt of his head, when Ingo says, "That's the point and call system, right?" 

And Emmet's responding grin is tenfold brighter than the surrounding streetlights. Ingo worries he's about to be swept up into another earnest hug, which he's not sure his bones can take, but Emmet just vibrates on the spot and launches into an explanation of the key gestures and motions of the system, the variations across regions, and how Emmet implements them in battles. 

Ingo had caught his brother watching videos of their battles together on his wrist device over breakfast that morning. When he revealed that his memory of their work and the trains they worked on was limited, Emmet's disappointment was palpable. Now, as then, Ingo listens with rapt attention as Emmet takes it upon himself to re-educate him on the details of what it is to be a Subway Master. 

It's not without some unease that Ingo realizes he has an entire engineering degree to recall, in addition to a profession, a family, and a life that he left behind. 

It's a relief when things return to him unbidden, especially alongside the notion that he had held onto habits born from years of learning as muscle-memory assertions of identity, despite the years between who he was and now is. 

As he concludes his overview, Emmet says with a sidelong glance to Elesa, "So, we should continue tonight. We have a schedule to keep." 

Lucas, the only one among them who stuck to plan and had sat down to eat with his Pokemon, calls over, "Do we have any reason to believe that Azelf won't issue a challenge at Valor, like Mesprit? Shouldn't we be well-rested for that?" As if to underscore his point, his Clefable yawns and tumbles backwards onto the nearby Tangrowth. Ingo can empathize. Tangrowth can be fairly comfortable when they want to be. 

With one vote for Elesa, Ingo suppresses laughter as Emmet scours the group for an ally. That Emmet doggedly avoids eye contact breaks his resolve, and Ingo asks after a quiet chuckle, "Are you so sure I wouldn't be on your side? I am as eager to reach our destination." 

"Yup," Emmet says simply, squints at him, and then adds, "Your eyebags have eyebags. And you were the first to suggest we start at Valor. Ingo's vote is to stay the night." 

Without a counterpoint, Ingo follows Lucas's lead and releases his first pair of Pokemon for their meals, Garbodor and Crustle. The provisions group had prepared divided kits of berries and feed, each labeled and paired with a handwritten ' Guide to your Unova Pokemon' in neat, straight up-and-down script. Garbodor, though, is disinterested in her allotted portion and heads instead for the nearest trash bin. If not for years of training in Hisui at snatching hasty kits by the scruff before they got themselves in trouble, Sneasel almost follows in pursuit until Ingo pulls her back to his lap. Crustle chitters loftily at Garbodor, but it's both these large, foreign Pokemon that draw the attention of the few onlookers. Ingo is glad of it, as he had been of his strange team in Hisui. If he was wont to draw attention anyway, he would prefer it turn to his larger-than-life Pokemon instead of his oddities or incongruity. 

Ingo marvels at these Pokemon of his and wishes he knew how to better tease out the memories of them. His battle with Emmet had yielded flashes of moments, a lucky catch of Excadrill's diminutive form in a small tunnel; hours upon hours of hatching tiny yellow insects to find the one that would become Emmet's Galvantula; his uncle's own Haxorus with her shy offspring. The clearest of them is a long, dark night lost in the woods, trees taller in his child's eyes, before the light of a little candle led him, against her nature, home to his brother.

Settled again and content with her berries, Sneasel churrs and taps his chin with the flat of her claw. Ingo closes his eyes, exhales, and strokes the back of her head, committing to memory her steady purring and her habit of plucking seeds from the flesh of each berry as best he can. He suspects, almost two days after the initial shock, that Lady Sneasler had allowed her kit to follow, and the notion makes his heart ache. 

Meanwhile, Akari weighs in on the decision to be made. "I say keep going." Emmet whoops, and Akari interrupts with a stern glare before continuing. "Only kind of because I want to get there sooner. The challenge issue really makes the case stronger for getting to Pastoria City tonight. We can rest there, between Route 212 and Lake Valor, instead of having this same conversation tomorrow afternoon after hiking through a bog all morning.”

Garbodor totters to Ingo's side the contents of one garbage can heavier and switches out for Excadrill. Ingo considers Akari's point. Neither were strangers to traveling at night, Akari for her duties completing Professor Laventon's Pokedex and Ingo simply due to force of habit. Sleep had been secondary to his responsibilities as Warden. 

Still, Emmet had been correct. Ingo's preference was the safer option. A daylight trek better ensures alert travelers ready for any issues that the weather, wild Pokemon, or unforeseen circumstances could impose. While Hearthome City's cleared streets and ambient urban warmth may have lulled them into a sense of security, there was still winter to contend with. 

Even so, the likelihood of the weather holding tonight, with evening skies clear and the threat of snow behind them, favored the proposed schedule. He couldn't say what tomorrow would hold. 

Attention turns to Iris as Ingo lets Excadrill, fending off Sneasel with one claw, sift through her selection of berries in his cupped hands. "Oh, uh," Iris starts, looking from Emmet to Elesa in quick succession. "I think it's still early enough that Akari is definitely right. It'd be one thing if it was late-late, but it only seems that way because the sun goes down so early. I think we keep going."

Emmet's immediate cheer stops short as he, presumably, recognizes the draw. For absolutely nothing to do with the attention that pivots his way now, Ingo decides it’s Haxorus's turn to eat. Chandelure too, for good measure. Four and a half years of practice at slouching out of scrutiny’s way is no help, though. Emmet hugs Haxorus's flank, tilting his torso around her to meet Ingo with eyes wide, expectant, and obviously practiced. "What was that earlier about being on my side?" 

Ingo is suddenly certain that he's the older brother. It's a minor data point, for twins, but one he feels in his bones. 

"I thought my vote was to stay the night?" Ingo asks, fishing in his pack for the right containers of food for his remaining two Pokemon as an alternative to eye contact. "I seem to recall something about my eyebags?"

" Ingo ," Emmet whines, but he's grinning like he's already won. Ingo leans back, clasping the rim of his hat to stay it, and turns to look at Elesa slouched against her bench with Emolga in her lap. She rolls her eyes when theirs meet, and shrugs. A concession.  

Aiming for his most serious expression as he turns back to his brother, Ingo says, "I concur with departing without delay on the condition we proceed with safety as priority."

Emmet lets go of Haxorus and pulls himself into a rigid salute, heels clicking together in time with the snap of his wrist. "Always!"  

Though Ingo notices the tight pull of his brow and the swell of muscle in his jaw, signs that he's beginning to understand indicate withheld pain--evidently with Ingo himself the cause--he doesn't press. While he feels entitled to lecture on the details of crossing a region whose demand for caution Ingo bore in every scar and reflex, he isn't sure of the boundaries that come with being Emmet's brother. Thus his position is to interrogate the familiar enough tracks ahead, and to pull back and monitor when it comes to Emmet. Although Ingo would prefer to anticipate the fall, the best he can justify in the roil of his uncertainty is to be there to catch him. 

Ingo cringes at the recollection of Emmet passing out a couple evenings prior, and sneaks in an extra berry for Chandelure. Emmet, watching, nods tightly and shrugs his own pack off his shoulders, dropping onto the ground beside Haxorus. He cranes his neck to look at Akari and Iris, fumbles with the wrapper of his meal bar, and says, "The all clear means we stop and fuel up now! It’s best to be prepared." 

The park grows raucous as the collection of Pokemon doubles in numbers and sheer scale. Secure in the company and his team already fed, Ingo lies back flat on the brick pavement and pulls his hat down over his eyes, adjusting his arm to allow for a crook for Sneasel to curl up into. The chatter, rustling of bags and feet, and the commotion of hungry, restless, eager Pokemon eases him not to sleep, but to rest beneath the gentle dark. The conversation blurs when Ingo doesn’t make the effort to focus, lifting into pitches and tones, dreamlike with the familiar pang which follows. 

Hearthome City, indeed. It’s not exact, but their lively ambience is enough to carry him towards memories of home. The thrum of his veins beats in twos like wheels on a track, and underneath the cover of his hat he can imagine buildings taller than he’s ever seen, endless mirages reflecting light on the horizon. 

Kricketune cries bounce across the sleepy garden path as it gives way to a waterlogged glade between a copse of winter-bare trees that tremble, silent, in the wind. The soggy patches of grass are half frozen, slush under his boots that Ingo has to take care to avoid while reserving the rest of his effort to ensure any stray wild Pokemon go undisturbed. 

The latent damp in the air dissuades Ingo from allowing Chandelure to lead the way and discourages Akari of the same with her Rapidash. Their descent down a cobblestone staircase and round the treeline leaves the neat garden lanterns fading behind them, the trail lit only intermittently from the moonlight between pockets of cloud cover. The group splits into pairs, habitual now, Akari and Elesa leading with Zebstrika's neon surges sending dramatic shadows across the clearing and the occasional small forms scurrying for the nearest cover. 

Iris joins Ingo and Sneasel, humming softly to herself and fidgeting with a pokeball at her waist. An expert at pensiveness himself, Ingo notes that her expression doesn't strike him as lost in thought insofar as presently occupied with it. He's caught between the desire not to derail her and rising curiosity when she shifts her consideration his way and says, "I was wondering what home will be like after all this."

Straight to the point, apparently. "Do you imagine it will be much different?" 

If Elesa is seeking a protégé in withering in looks, Ingo has a promising candidate. Two days, harrowing trial aside, and Iris has him pinned. "I only mean--" 

Facing forward again, she thumps into his shoulder, knocking Sneasel off-kilter and quieting him with the need to hush her responding hissing. With a soft apology, Iris continues, "I think I understand. I guess you can't really tell, but I think you're making a difference already." She clasps his free hand in hers, careful of the morning's fresh bandages. "A good difference!" 

"I hadn't realized that anything needed to change," Ingo says, pressing her hand once in return and then letting it drop, limp, back to his side. At first, she only shook her head, expression pulling distant, and they walk in silence as the trail leads them towards a meandering river shore. The path is low against the bank, the tide lapping at his boots. It's Ingo's circle around Iris to put himself between her and the waterline that has her speaking again.

"We try to look out for each other, but it just seems to come more naturally to you. Honestly, if it wasn't for Elesa, I don't know if Dad or I would have considered that Emmet could be overdoing it. Or really that overdoing it is a thing to worry about for any of us." She imitates the point-and-call motion again, the pokeball she's been toying with tight in her grip. This time she is perfectly sharp, exact to time. Practiced, like Emmet’s expressions. The ball stays in her grip but Ingo can imagine its exact arc, the red light release bright in his mind’s eye. 

"I've always looked up to Emmet. Which means, I guess, that I've probably always looked up to you, too. But, I'm still trying to figure out what it means when that person is human, and makes dumb choices, or needs help sometimes." She sighs, and pulls the pokeball close to her chest, folding both hands at her heart. "It might've been easier from our own pedestals, Champion and Subway Master, to just be those people to each other, even if we only ever needed to be family.”

Iris looks at Ingo with wide eyes seeking something from him and he wishes there was a convenient God Pokemon to accuse of setting this weight that bears heavy on her shoulders. Of course, there's nothing to be gained from blame beyond the momentary salve of self-righteousness. On her behalf or not, it wouldn't untether her to rage on her behalf, to tell her she shouldn't have been made to feel responsible in the first place, not at her age, not alone, without an actual solution.  

As the riverside trail becomes a low plank bridge that groans with their weight, Ingo hums low to confirm he's still present, considering. As he begins to speak, however, aiming for reassurance without leaning onto platitudes, the walkway lurches beneath them from the force of an impact some ways beyond them. 

Ingo catches Iris by her elbow and veers his attention to the pair ahead in time to witness the slack maw of a wild Gyarados rise from the water's surface at the edge of the bridge. Elesa is pitched over onto her hip with Akari squatting low beside her, but instead of the normal concern one would expect when in the sights of an enraged Gyarados, Elesa's staring up at it underneath tired half-lids and saying in a self-assured tone, "Oh, for fuck's sake."

The Gyarados roars in reply, pulling higher into the air with a whip of its long body that splashes Elesa as she climbs to her feet. Swiping her now damp braids behind her, she turns towards Ingo and the rest with a look of incredulity, her countenance saying are you seeing this but in none of the ways that Ingo expects. 

Emmet jogs towards her, clapping Ingo on the back as he passes. Her footing regained, Iris whines from beside him, "No fair , I never get double weaknesses."

Over his shoulder, Emmet calls, "Diversify your team!" and Iris huffs that her team is plenty diverse in response and takes off after him. 

Well, then. Ingo gathers his courage. 

Closer, the hot stench of Gyarados breath is a sensation he could do without, and Ingo finds himself thankful that the one that circled above the Obsidian Fieldlands had a penchant for higher altitudes. As it thrashes again towards the boards, Elesa and Emmet share a glance and release their Pokemon in tandem, Elesa returning Zebstrika for something better suited to the water. A matching pair of Eelektross take to the water between the bridge and the Gyarados, intervening on its attempt to send them into the water. Elesa's Eelektross shakes off the brunt of the blow and both crackle with electricity, sending sweeps of steam around them with the surrounding discharge. 

Elesa wipes at the dirt splotching across the knees and shins of her leggings, then looks to Emmet. "I think it's about time we send this big guy back to bed, yeah?" 

Emmet grins. "Agreed. Shall we, Eelektross?" 

The lightning is bright enough to sear white behind Ingo’s eyelids as zap cannon and thunderbolt carry across the water and up the coils of Gyarados's underbelly. That's all it takes, the combination of strategic advantage and two-on-one an easy match against blind rage, and stray static still crawls around its body as it reels backwards and collapses flat into the surface with a great splat. Ingo winces at the sound, eyes still adjusting to the dark-light-dark, and understands more about why he and Akari had frightened Hisui with their ease around wild Pokemon. Hisui wouldn’t have known what to do with these two. 

"Bravo! Is everyone alright?" Ingo shouts just in time for his vision to clear as Lucas catches up with the group. Elesa startles, likely at the volume, but, when she turns to him, she's smiling.

"Just a bit charged up," She says, pulling her hair back over her shoulder to wring out the braids. "I could have done without the splashing, but, you know. What can you do?" 

Beside her Emmet flips the catch on his pokeball to return Eelektross. "I’m fine! Was that overkill?" 

"Not a chance," Elesa says, voice firm. "I appreciated the backup. One miss and it could've been an evening dip I didn't sign up for."

They didn't have much choice. The grassy landing beyond the bridge is a brief respite before the ground gives beneath them. With far more emotion than with faced with the Gyarados, Elesa says again, "For fuck's sake," and trudges forward into the marsh. Within steps, the mud collects up to her knees, and she tosses her head over her shoulder and looks to Ingo and Emmet, stricken.

There’s nothing to do but follow. Iris, shortest among them, sits atop Ingo's shoulders with Sneasel tucked under a folded arm. There's the option of riding their Pokemon across, but the lucky combination of both willing and able to take them across was limited to Torterra, who carries Akari, and Salamence, who no one was eager to fly at night on an unfamiliar route without Drayden leading the charge. 

Though they proceed silently, their heavy trudging disrupts local Wooper, which peek their heads half out of the mud to burble and coo at them, entirely innocuous if not for the thin toxic membrane that Lucas reminds them coats their skin. At first there’s just the one following behind at a fair distance. Another joins, then three across the way, and soon enough they’re surrounded. 

Emmet mimics the little O shapes they make with their mouths, cooing right back, until the night breaks into a swamp song chorus with Emmet the conductor. As they press forward, the Wooper rise and fall from the mud, carrying their tune with them and emerging with notes crystal clear beside them at oddly regular intervals. When a drowsy-eyed Quagsire surfaces to contribute a low harmony, it's all Ingo can do not to tip over in laughter and dump Iris and Sneasel unceremoniously into the bog.

From ahead on Torterra, Akari throws him a glowing smile, swaying at her shoulders, a little offbeat. Lucas attempts to pull closer to Emmet, jogging a challenge waist deep in mire, recording with his phone. Ingo remembers that the device has a light on the back to help capture photos, and is reminded again of Rei when Lucas keeps it unlit to avoid distressing the Wooper. 

Even Elesa, intent as she is on marching through the mud without delay, slows enough to listen a moment, then joins in by whistling the occasional grace note to complement the tune as she pushes ahead. 

Iris, almost too quiet for Ingo to hear above the din, says, "See? I told you so. A good difference."

Ingo allows himself to imagine that simply being here, being home, is worthwhile. Just this once, the lakes, his memories, why Hisui him in the first place, could wait. Tonight he can be enough as he is. 

That night, Ingo slept like the dead. 

Admittedly, most nights since returning he slept heavy, which he contributes in part to the comfort of modern beds and in part to the Sneasel on his face blocking out all ambient light and possibly his airways. However, today he slept until noon, when Emmet apparently decided enough was enough and stormed into the room he shared with Akari and Lucas, who had abandoned him for breakfast.

Upon being roused, but before properly awake, Ingo had told Emmet that they had agreed only one of them was going to be a morning person and it certainly wasn't going to be him. After recovering from his delight at this new information, Emmet took to his role with vigor. 

In Ingo's defense, it had been past midnight when they arrived in Pastoria City. Upon learning at the Pastoria Pokemon Center that Sinnoh's famous Hotel Grand Lake was on the Valor Lakefront just a short oceanside walk away, the votes in favor of making some additional headway that night quickly outnumbered Ingo. Given the state of them, disheveled and mud-soaked, a brief trek to the hotel devolved into rinsing off fully dressed at the beachside showers and waiting, with some help from Rapidash and Lucas's Magmortar, for their clothing to dry. 

Well worth it, in the end, if Ingo's back and shoulders have a say. Emmet finally forces him from bed, and Ingo stretches to stand at the same height. When Emmet's eyebrow raises at the level eye contact, Ingo rolls his back slightly forward, force of habit. 

With a squint, Emmet plucks Sneasel up from the end of the bed and gathers Ingo's pokeballs from the desk at the far end of the room. "I'll get them fed. Meet us out on the beach! Lucas is expecting that kid from the phone."

As he strides around the corner towards the entryway, Ingo calls after him, "Be nice!" 

"I'm very nice," he calls back, and the door falls closed behind him. Silence, slow, settles on the room in his absence and Ingo scrubs a hand down his face and counts to three. 

The man in the mirror is a ghost. Ingo had worn his Pearl Clan tunic to bed, and his stubble had cropped up with its usual vengeance. He fishes in the complimentary toiletries for a plastic razor, and the quality of the hotel rewards him with a fairly nice blade and shaving cream. 

The decision to shave had been an impulse, some combination of discomfort at being regarded as something other by Drayden and Elesa as well as at looking so different from his brother. Similar was the decision to grow the beard in the first place, as a counterpoint to the empty, unshaven, deteriorating man that Lady Sneasler had found dying in the Icelands. 

The videos from the subway suggest that his impulse was correct. In the time before, Ingo had worn his face clean-shaven. So, he lets the razor follow the curve of his chin, careful and slow, and washes the foamy remains of white-gray hair down the basin drain. The splash of cold water across his face a relief, he considers his reflection again. 

Hoping for what, he isn't sure. 

It's still him. 

He pulls his back straight again, and traces a thumb over the purple smudges beneath his eyes. Four and a half years and he could look a decade older still, if he allowed himself to. 

It hadn't occurred to him in Hisui, when his mind would conjure up the stranger with his face, that time had changed him. Whatever face Ingo wore was the face that haunted him. Initially off a long journey from their home region and whatever lifestyle Iris had been alluding to, Emmet carried himself with a similar gravity as Ingo. Perhaps not in his posture, but exhaustion wore him thin and frayed. Ingo waits for the same vibrance to find him that had found Emmet, and wonders what he's doing wrong to still feel so tired and hollowed out. 

He drops his shoulders and leans his forehead, briefly, against the mirror glass. It's time to go. 

At the waterline, the memory of skipping stones with Akari at Prelude Beach days ago is palpable and Ingo, gently, shuts that longing and the rest of it away to wave at Iris and greet Chandelure as she phases into his path. Akari and Lucas are watching the sky to the northeast, hands shading their eyes to block out the early afternoon sun, talking amongst themselves while Torterra and Empoleon dig around in the sand. 

Elesa is dangling one of the wrist devices over the water, Sneasel clambering for it at her feet. Emmet is distressed at this, suggesting that it most likely belongs to him. 

"I am going to re-route your emails to my Gym and have the trainers crowdsource solutions if you don't leave it, Emmet. I don't think any of them know how to drive, I certainly don't, so I have to imagine civil engineering for transportation systems might be a no go."

Before Emmet responds, Ingo raises his voice to ask on the approach, "Is something wrong?" 

Elesa's face lights up when she sees him, and she lobs the device in his direction. Reflexes not among his many issues, Ingo catches it in one hand as she explains. "Somebody sent some sixty emails this morning before I got a call from a concerned friend who suddenly thought Emmet was on his way back to the office ahead of schedule."

Ingo holds out the device towards Emmet and Elesa looks up at the sky as if she were considering asking Arceus to send her away next. As Emmet snatches it back, Ingo asks, "Was it important to respond promptly?" 

"I don't delay work unnecessarily."

At that non-answer, Ingo looks at Elesa and says, "I see what you mean."

Any response Elesa can offer is cut off by the cry of a Staraptor and an equally loud shout for Lucas. The three of them turn towards the kids as the offending Staraptor lands hard into the sand, sending tufts upwards at Lucas and Akari as she digs her talons into the ground for purchase. A boy, the same from the phone at Lake Verity and the photograph of Akari, vaults from the curve between its nape and back and flings himself at Lucas. Grabbing his shoulders, the boy launches into a discussion that Ingo can't quite make out until he nears them. 

"... I even ran it by my dad and he didn't know what you were talking about. Are you absolutely sure? You'd think it'd be something I'd know about, right? Someone we traveled with? Did the Pokedex with? I don't think that's something I'd just forget." 

Beside them, Akari recoils, her small smile tight and gaze diverting to the ground. Ingo picks up pace, knowing an incoming wreck when he sees one, but something changes. The Staraptor's trainer quiets, pulling his hand to his mouth, thoughtful. Lucas waits, patient stare almost imperceptibly stony. Akari's sternum rises and falls with a deep breath, and she raises her head, pulling her neck taut. Ingo knows the look in her eyes, alight with hope and dread, well by now. 

Ingo stops a few paces away from the group, and swings out his left arm to signal that Elesa, Emmet and Iris hold back. 

The boy glances from Lucas to Akari, and then says, "Okay, got it."

As simple as that. 

He swipes his hand behind his head and musses up his hair, shoving out the other for a handshake. "Hi, Akari. I'm Barry. Nice to see you again!" 

When Akari shakes his hand, the tension leaks her from tight limbs and her frightened eyes, leaving her drained rather than relieved. The moment shifts towards the weight of explanation, a tired battle by now. But then Barry releases the grip on his hair and says, "You can say no, but I actually… I think I’d like to give you a hug? If that's okay? I don’t have a good reason so really you can say--" 

Staraptor squawks at the force with which Akari pulls Barry in. Lucas stands awkwardly beside them for a moment before Akari and Barry, in tandem, grab at his sleeve and drag him down with them as they sink to the sand, laughing. 

With a twist of his extended wrist, pointing up and then behind him, Ingo gestures for himself and the others to give the three of them space. There would likely be explanations due, but, for now, Ingo knew that Akari deserves this moment. 

Three days and centuries ago, Ingo promised to take her home. It shouldn't surprise him, after the events since, that home would start to find her.

Chapter Text

"Azelf's trial was the worst," Akari says after her tears have all dried. She sits wedged shoulder-to-shoulder between Lucas and Barry, delivering an ad hoc brief on what happened at Lake Valor back in Hisui. 

On Iris's suggestion, they’re planning by the beach on Route 213, situated on a tight outcropping under the crooked shade of a high rock shelf. After a summary of the journey so far, augmented by the texts that Lucas sent to him in advance as bare minimum explanation, Barry was as eager as Emmet to press forward to Lake Valor immediately. They were resoundingly out-voted. 

The cold waves crash and foam under the growing gale while the day dips colder as afternoon advances. Ingo's passing premonition of a gathering storm has Emmet on edge every time the shoreline yearns towards them, and he eyes the overcast sky with growing distrust. The weather needs to hold in order to avoid unnecessary delays. 

In response to Akari, Ingo groans. She shimmies her arms out from between her friends to hold her hands up, palms out, in either apology or consolation. "Nothing terrible, just tedious,” she says, “I had to throw balms at it, like with the frenzied Nobles, but it went out of its way to make that difficult." She pauses to consider, which gives Emmet the chance to connect the dots between Nobles and the evolved Sneasel variant that Ingo refers to as 'the Lady'. The frenzies, though, he will have to follow up on. Later. 

Akari, meanwhile, continues, "I think the challenge was when it would tell me to give up. It was about saying no and trying harder, even if I had already had enough even before I made it to Lake Valor." 

Ingo pushes himself off the sand, sets Sneasel in Iris's lap, and paces at the shoreline behind them. After a few laps, he says, "Mesprit's trial was to share--in your own words--your emotions regarding your experiences after your arrival to Hisui. It might be safe to assume Azelf, like Mesprit, differs from its past self insofar as the challenges it prefers to issue."

"To be completely honest, its questions were uncalled for. I was exiled, you were imprisoned, apparently, the world was ending, Volo was just hanging out without me knowing what he was up to yet, and Mesprit wanted to know how I felt about it all." Roughly halfway through her list, she uses Lucas's and Barry's shoulders as a brace to hoist herself to her feet. To close, she kicks up a tuft of sand, and then winces when she peeks up at Ingo. "Right, not the point."

Lucas raises his hand. Barry seems enthralled, foot bouncing rapidly at the end of one bent leg. Before either of them can start, Emmet says, hurried, "Elaborate on that?" Then, calmer, "Please?" 

Emmet anticipates, by now, how this will go, even without the flustered way that Akari chews her lip and takes a sudden interest in the divot her boots have left in the sand. His imagination precedes Ingo by milliseconds, the voice in his head and his brother's actual firm, loud "Later, Emmet," overlapping like a musical round. It was considerate that, alongside affection and admiration, Mesprit was sure to return such important brotherly emotions as irritation and frustration. 

Though Elesa pats his arm to stop him from pushing, Emmet does know how to be patient when it matters. Instead of forcing the issue, he leans backward and rolls his head over the nape of his neck, catching his weight on the flats of his hands. Watching Ingo pace upside down, he states more than asks, "But you will tell us later?" 

Ingo looks at him for a long moment, then nods. His fists clench and then release at his sides. Emmet jerks his neck back upright, swallowing down the nausea that's only mostly vertigo. A similar arrangement wordlessly passes between the kids, clearly to Barry's dismay if his pout is an indication, and Lucas says, "So what you're trying to say, Mr. Ingo, is that there's no reason to expect anything consistent between Azelf then and now." Ingo must nod again, because Lucas deflates. 

Leaning her forehead flat onto Emmet's shoulder, Elesa sighs. "That sounds to me like there's nothing we can do to prepare." 

Akari drops back down onto the sand in the middle of the two groups. "Probably not.” 

Barry regards the lot of them with narrowed eyes, landing finally on Akari. "Isn't getting past Azelf a good thing? You guys are half way to talking yourselves out of it." 

Sand scatters onto Emmet's hands as Ingo steps up behind him. Emmet considers interrupting his brother to insist that he can make a point against haste without needing to loom quite so much. 

"It would be unwise to press ahead to our destination without ensuring we are fully prepared. We proceeded to the first trial without considering the required safety checks."

With a sliding whistle, Barry turns back to Akari, "Did he talk like this is Ancient Sinnoh?" 

She nods with a quick, toothy smile, and he grins right back. "Awesome. Bet they had no idea what to do with that. I'm not saying I'm not completely stoked that you both made it back, cause I am, but just think how much better Sinnoh would be if we figured out trains, like, a couple hundred years sooner."

"It would certainly help with all the walking," Elesa mutters into Emmet's bicep, "But I'm going to have to side with the events that gets all of us back to where we belong, functional public transportation or not." 

Ingo clears his throat emphatically, attempting to steer the conversation back to Lake Valor. "I suspect the right order would be to plan how we respond, rather than to try to anticipate what the trial will be. Given events at Lake Verity, I suggest we prioritize not becoming uncoupled at all costs."

"Agreed," Iris says, a reprieve from her effort so far to only pay attention to Sneasel. "We shouldn't pair and break off like we usually do."

Emmet should listen, really. It's irresponsible not to. But a flock of Wingull careen overhead, screeching, and his head already throbbed just under the surface. Once he loses the thread, he shifts to feigning focus, catching what bits of the conversation he can between the wave crash cadence and the fizz of sea-foam that just brushes his fingertips as they spread out behind him to hold his weight. 

It isn't that he disagrees with the need to set the safest route ahead. What contingencies they could apply and diversions they could anticipate would only aid them in the trial to come. He just hadn't slept. Not for more than a few hours, at least, and not for want of trying. 

At half-past three, Emmet woke up unable to breathe in the room that he shared with Iris and Elesa. There were bruises, two neat purple lines of four that made him sick with shame, beneath Elesa's shirtsleeves from how hard he gripped her in his desperation for a lifeline. When it was over, after gasping in lungfuls of air for seconds like hours, Iris had asked him what the nightmare was about and Emmet couldn't say. 

The yawning hollow of it ached and Emmet found this familiar. It opened up to greet him like his face in the mirror, pervasive with wrongness without an explanation for why. Easy enough to get lost in, and by design no less, if Emmet had to guess. 

What did he dream about? Had he remembered a single dream he had in the past four years and counting? 

There was no sleep after that. Despite Elesa's and Iris's protests, he raided the kitchenette for the coffee machine and every complimentary variation the staff had stocked. With the duvet swept over his shoulders, he set up at the desk in the corner to watch every battle recording he could find of the Multi Battle Circuit to stave off the void. 

Now, here, where the air tastes like brine and smells like the promise of rain, an ice-cold wave engulfs his hand up to his wrist. His flinch is just enough to jostle Elesa and catch her attention, but the expectant look she gives him is less are you okay and more are you back . No demands for explanations, she meets him where he’s at. 

Emmet knows he wouldn't be able to do this without her. 

He tries to capture the certainty of that in his smile. With a shrug and a smile in return, she shifts to press her side against his and carries the conversation for them both from then on. 

In retrospect, Emmet isn't sure there was much they could have done to prepare. 

Lake Valor stands still, clear, and beautiful in the afternoon light, silent except for a Chingling that hops along the shoreline out to the nearby tree cover when they approach. Ingo scans the sky and makes a dark comment about the eyes of storms, which Emmet is fairly certain is a sea thing but doesn't know enough about weather, the ocean, or Sinnoh to argue. 

An island crests the surface of the lake at its center, all sheer ridges and seemingly barren from their angle. Lucas is only just starting to confirm the cave is on the other side when the hum of a pokeball alerts them to Barry releasing a Pokemon into the water and leaping on before the light even gives way to a fully solid Floatzel. 

By the time Lucas regains his composure and releases Empoleon, Barry is waiting at the edge of the island, shouting at them to get a move on. Iris steps forward with a huff, plucking a pokeball from her sleeve and saying, "So much for sticking together."

Alongside Empoleon she releases her Lapras, and Emmet recalls her diversion to the PC at the Pastoria City Pokemon Center with a surge of pride and gratitude. The kids pile onto Empoleon, who doesn't seem thrilled with three passengers but manages, while Lapras ferries Elesa, Emmet and Ingo with Sneasel across. 

Barry waits, digging the toe of his boot into the mud, and stops short of complaining when Elesa and Ingo level him with a look Emmet thought was reserved only for him, personally. 

"Alright," Akari says at the end of an exhale. "We stay together from here on out. Ingo and I do most of the talking, nobody says anything mean and nobody gives any indication, any hint of being willing to give up, no matter what Azelf throws at us." She makes steady eye contact with each of them in turn. "Okay?" 

In an echo of their appeal to Empoleon at Verity Lakefront, Ingo and Emmet salute in concert, and Sneasel imitates the motion from her hold on Ingo's back. This time, Akari's grin doesn't quite reach her eyes. She waits for nods and verbal agreement to flow across the others, and sets her jaw firm. "Okay. Let's go."

Azelf does not make them wait. It, twin-tailed and blue-toned, hovers between two arrays of dry land cutting through the swathes of standing water that lie stagnant on the cave floor. Besides the afternoon haze at the entrance, obscured by the steep downward slope that guides them into the guts of the cave, its yellow eyes are the only source of light. To ignore how anticipation has his heart beat climbing up the length of his jugular, Emmet strains his eyes to take in the room's layout and the design of the pools, hoping the others do the same. 

The air grows heavy with a sudden bout of humidity as a clear voice rings at the exact origin of his headache. "This is folly. Will you proceed?" 

Emmet watches Ingo's posture tighten and straighten as he seems to fight every instinct to step out in front of the group and presses his forearm, hoping that it's grounding. Together Ingo and Akari say, "Yes."

"Then you must leave." 

Azelf coils in the air, emitting a current of psychic power towards them. Emmet's next breaths come out shallow from the back of his throat and his nails dig into Ingo's arm. He can't do this, not again. He needs to stay present, as himself, or otherwise he's not sure how he's supposed to survive the aftermath. His vision tunnels, black fog coiling in at the edges and shit he needs to see. This can't keep happening, this isn't-- 

Ingo tears his arm from Emmet's grasp, rough enough, cruel enough, to haul Emmet’s focus back. Sudden hurt bitter like stomach acid bile, Emmet drags what's left of his sight up to his brother. 

As the last to break free from Mesprit's spell at Lake Verity, Emmet never saw it firsthand, but he was fairly certain that Akari hadn't described their irises glowing cerulean. Bright blue eyes a new light to the black cavern, Ingo stands at his full height so that they’re eye to eye so that he can stare directly through Emmet, again, like he’s nothing, before turning sharp on his heel and stalking away. Akari follows, Barry left with her discarded coat after he lunges for her to catch only nylon. 

Emmet reels around to follow--they have to stay together--but then Azelf’s voice is right on his eardrum. "Will you abandon your trial so soon?" 

Emmet freezes. 

Understanding now, his tunnel vision wanes and he can see clearly as it happens. When Ingo and Akari step beyond the light pooling at the mouth of the cave, three things follow. 

The ground beneath them shifts with the fracture of stone on stone and someone hauls him stumbling back by a fistful of his shirt. 

He can hear the baritone echo of Ingo at his loudest, but Emmet cannot make out anything he says. Red then purple light disrupts the darkness as Chandelure emerges a short distance from the group. 

The far front wall above the exit collapses in a cavalcade of rock and rubble, trapping them in the cavern beneath it. 

Quiet follows. 

Emmet allows himself three jittery breaths before putting on his best confident face, spinning around to face the others. Chandelure's glow casts their array of startled expressions in more shadow than light, and Barry flounders at a few attempts to ask what happened. Elesa holds up her hand, pointer finger half-raised, to hush him as she scrutinizes the kids and then Emmet with narrowed, searching eyes. "Is everyone alright? Still themselves? At least, as far as you know?" 

Before any of them can reply, their attention swings to another crack, then another, then a third from the wall at the end of the cavern, followed by the gush of flooding water. At the deepest part of the cave, Lake Valor rushes in. When it reaches the standing pool arrays, the water level rises with alarming speed, and Emmet realizes that this is an emergency. 

So he knows what to do. 

He snatches Elesa's hand, frozen still mid-gesture, and reaches across to grab the next nearest, Barry's, pitching his voice up to yell, "Hold hands. There's five of us. Two outside. We need the water Pokemon."

Elesa grabs Iris, who in turn pulls Lucas in. Three electric whirs and Empoleon, Lapras, and Floatzel wait at the ready. The water laps the ridges of Emmet's boots, and he considers climbing the incline toward the smothered entrance but decides the risk is too high for the kids. Azelf’s doing or not, recent cave-ins aren't safe, however tempting the steep climb away from the rising water may currently appear. 

Instead, Emmet throws out his arms and guides them out of the path of rolling boulders, then sends his left hand in an arcing point at Chandelure. Her responding trill warbles with panic, and she tries to phase to Emmet's side. "Nope," he insists. "Go high. We need light and warmth."

From the far southwestern corner, the exact opposite direction, something familiar screeches. Shit. His first instinct is to break into a run towards it, and the way that Elesa clutches his hand suggests he must give away that he’s about to. Emmet's compromise is to release Eelektross and wordlessly point at the dark, keening corner. It's the faster option, even without the water at swimming height. Eelektross departs and returns in a flash to deposit a hissing Sneasel into Emmet's arms and return to his pokeball. 

Sneasel must have fled when Azelf turned Ingo. It's the more reassuring option than the image of her being cast aside into the dark by his not-brother brother, so for now Emmet attempts some soothing noises and undoes the top of his coat and pulls his right arm free from his sleeve to press her against his chest. Who needs nondominant hands, anyways?  

The water bites at his ankles, finding the gaps between his socks and trousers and seeping through the fabric of his inner layers. Remembering words, he says to the kids, "The three of you take Lapras. Elesa…" he pauses, passing between the remaining water types before landing on the floatation sac ringing around Floatzel's head. "Elesa with Floatzel."

The apprehensive glance that Elesa gives him suggests that she understands his decision parameters, but she does not argue. Barry lets go of Emmet's hand to swing up onto Lapras's back, while Iris helps Lucas clamber up behind her. 

The water isn't deep enough yet for Elesa or Emmet to justify climbing onto the Pokemon, especially because they’ll be partially submerged and need to acclimate to the water, anyway. At this rate, the flood is rising steadily to up their legs with the accompanying cold that seeps beneath his skin. Emmet says, more to himself than anything, "Is it trying to kill us?" 

The voice returns in his head like an earworm. "Will you yield?"

Elesa and Barry both answer for him: "No." 

Emmet tilts his head up to the high ceiling of the cave under which Chandelure hovers and considers. Her flame doesn't emit heat unless in attack, which at this point she's only trained to do in intense bursts of overheat meant to more or less melt her opponents at the cost of her own stamina. He could ask for heat now, or wait and conserve her power. Barry has Infernape and Lucas Magmortar, but neither float. It would help to know , to have a single thread to pull on what they would need to do beyond just not conceding. Azelf's commentary was a sign that there was a way out. Emmet just had to hope that it wouldn't take the water swallowing the cave in its entirety to find it. 

Beside him, Elesa uses her free hand to rub at the outside of her arm and bobs from leg to leg. Sneasel shakes against his chest, but Emmet hopes that's more to do with a cacophony of emotions than the cold given her downy fur-and-feather coat.

He wonders if Chandelure would be able to better tolerate burning warm if she absorbs some of his spirit as fuel. She hadn't in years, not since she evolved from Lampent, and even then she had needed to in order to help--

When the void encroaches, Emmet knows it like an old friend. 

The void is the absence of cold, of fear, of the instinct and training that overrides every frayed and fried synapse in his brain. It welcomes him, here in the dark, like sleep without dreams. He could follow it to the quiet and allow himself to be lost, he knows, but where it once felt like falling, it now feels like hiding away. 

And he catches himself on the question of what he could need to hide from. It's enough to send the hollow of it back to the edges of his mind, where it could lie in wait. 

Their current circumstances reemerge in individual sensations and then all at once. Sneasel purrs frantic against him and Elesa's hand is trembling in his. Inhale, exhale, repeat. He has to breathe deeper, with the cold immediate before it ebbs back again to a dull, almost scorching ache. The kids are talking beside them, Lucas currently, desperately working at solutions.

"Mister Ingo and Akari had to come find us and talk us out of the stupor. Maybe we need to find them and do the same?" 

Iris counters. "I think it was just to get them outside. Ingo sent Chandelure here to help us, which makes me think he broke free before the cave in." 

"Besides," Barry adds, "leaving through the front door would be giving up." 

"Not if we have to dig our way out, Barry," Lucas grumbles, but appears to cede to Iris's point. 

Emmet scours the cave for what must be the fiftieth time. The water, submerging his legs above the knee now, obscures all but the taller stalagmites and laps at the slope towards the blocked exit. The rubble appears stable except for a couple of pebbles that tumble idly off the flatter mass of stones at the foot of the wreckage. There's nothing that can help them along the tapered walls besides the breaks through which the lake flows in. 

"One way to find out," Emmet says, and against his own guidance drops Elesa's hand and turns to Empoleon to consider whether the water was deep enough to have her swim him across to the slope. Elesa hisses his name as he decides to trudge forward on his feet, but what is the alternative? To stand and wait? And if they're wrong, what then? 

Though he hopes Azelf won’t drown them, he has no reason to believe they can afford anything but victory here. Darkness still hovers at the edges of his vision and the reaches of his mind, waiting for him to misstep. He is cold, he is exhausted, and he has no idea what he needs to do, but Emmet will not leave this cave with the void still lingering, hungry for anything that could connect his brother to his own life. 

When he steps onto the dry incline, Azelf says, "Is this the way?" 

"You tell me," Emmet shouts, voice echoing through the cave. His wet boots slip on the dust so that he has to pull himself up the slope hand and feet with Sneasel still pressed against him, claiming an arm. "You set the route. You made the schedule. I'm your passenger." He reaches the rubble and stares up at the mass of it. Surely a civil engineer can figure out a pile of rocks? "But you will not defeat me. If I'm wrong, you'll tell me so. You'll ask me if I'm giving up." Pitting his fingers into the grit between the stones, he tows out the first piece. "So do you have something else to ask me?" 

There's no response, his mind home only to the fever pitch bewilderment at the audacity of his own stupid mouth. He could laugh, but is afraid that would be one move too far, and settles instead for casting his head over his shoulder to see if the others had heard. Azelf, that is. Emmet had, after all, been shouting. 

Floatzel carries Elesa towards the landing, the water apparently reaching a swimming depth during his climb. She's telling Lucas, Barry and Iris to stay put, which goes well. As they aspire for a compromise, Emmet releases Durant close beside him, and asks, "Help me with this? Before the water gets too high." 

For a short while, it's effective. Durant's skill at climbing allows Emmet to direct him towards the boulders he's concerned will become hazards if they attempt to tunnel straight through. Chandelure, meanwhile, hovers closer overhead with short bursts of hot flame that clearly strain her to spread out, but help return feeling to his numb legs. 

The thought occurs to him that offsetting labor onto his Pokemon could be perceived in one of two ways: as an indication of their bonds as teammates, or as an indication of his own lack of determination. Years old wounds from protests in Nimbasa against the labor of Pokemon used in the expansion of the subway system itch like fresh scabs. The void yawns wide, threatening to pitch him back towards the dark, because he hadn't faced that alone, had he? 

Durant drops a rock beside him and prods him with his mandibles. Emmet squeezes his eyes shut, pinches at the thin skin above his knuckles, and mumbles an apology. 

Back to it. 

Elesa reaches him as the waterline curls up the halfway point of the slope. She holds her hands up to warm under Chandelure and asks, "Are you sure about this?" 

"Yes." Then, quiet, "No. I don't know what else to do."

Elesa doesn't press, doesn't admonish, doesn't insist on all the should haves that could have led elsewhere. Instead she says, "Okay," and "Let me help." 

There's not enough room for another Pokemon, whether or not her all-electric team could help. So, she adds her strength to Emmet's as they shove the larger boulders that Durant has displaced back into the water behind them. Given the effort Emmet is making to accommodate Sneasel, alongside his refusal to consider anything other than holding her close, Elesa’s help ends up essential to making the most of what time Durant has to work with. 

When the cold is again at his ankles, Emmet returns Durant and looks up at what is left to dig. Though his shoulder and back ache with the progress they’ve made, the effort to reinforce unstable areas leaves the overall structure no smaller than when he started. He wonders if they can manage this on their own. 

Elesa rocks back on her heels, Floatzel buoying her as she nearly tumbles back into the water. Empoleon swims up to him and plucks at his coat sleeve in a way that’s almost parental. With the facts as they are, Emmet concedes one point. Carefully unbundling her from the lining of his coat, Emmet holds Sneasel up to Empoleon and says, "Her mother saved Ingo. Keep her safe." 

Shortly thereafter, Emmet has to swim. It strikes him that he doesn't know how long has passed, that even though he has time waterproof on his wrist and the uncanny ability to keep count in his head, the chatter of his teeth and the thudding of his heart doesn't follow any logical measure of seconds. Then it's Lake Verity again, and the need to fall back into precise count creeps up, but his fingers are purple beneath the layer of dust and ruddy red from beneath his fingernails, and Elesa's lips are running blue despite her position atop Floatzel. 

All the while, Azelf had been silent. 

At the same moment as he thinks it, Emmet asks, "What happens if I'm wrong?" 

"I don't know if it matters," Elesa mutters with a grunt as she twists her hands around a rock that they hadn't been able to budge. "As long as we get out of here." She says ' here ' with effort, curling her fingers and then yanking backward with her shoulder-blades. The stone comes loose, longer than they thought, and Elesa's fingers flare wide to drop it before it drags her off Floatzel’s back. They both peer into the hole it left behind, and Emmet could cry when meager veins of light peer back from the gaps between the stones.  

Unprepared for a piece of that length, Emmet's side of the rubble sags inwards to fill the space and steal the light. But it's something. It is all the confirmation that they've got. 

Barry yells for their attention. Iris, equally loud but using her words, elaborates, "The water stopped rising!" 

They hold. Aside from the gentle paddling of fins and flippers, and the less gentle splashes of Emmet's effort to tread water, the flood rush has gone still and the surface levels out in ripples around the four swimmers. 

In the momentary quiet, Emmet hears something slam against the far side of the barrier. He wades sideways to press Elesa, Floatzel and himself out of the way, but the sound and force is unaccompanied by any equal reaction of gravity. Not a stone nor pebble shifts, even when the sound begins to repeat itself rhythmically against the outside wall. 

Under her breath, Elesa says, "They're trying to get to us." 

"And it is doing nothing," Emmet replies, grits his chattering teeth and inhales deeply despite the way that oxygen runs through his esophagus and into his lungs like fire. 

With that he dives under, intent on searching out a slightly lower stone that he thought would clear out the portion of rock that had collapsed into the opening Elesa created. The water is clear, an eerie purple and blue under Chandelure's glow, and he doesn't need to dive deep. But the cold catches up with him. 

As shoves his hands around the stone in question, his vision spots and blurs. And Emmet knows it's not the same as forgetting, but that doesn't stop the spike of adrenaline that sends him gasping for air that is not there. The lake water he chokes down in its place is frigid and wedges in his airway like something barbed. Still stupidly, stubbornly clinging to the rock, he wants to try to kick off the rubble up towards the surface, but his legs swing and catch nothing. He's too exhausted to make a second attempt. 

When Empoleon drags him to the surface by the collar of his coat, he doesn't even realize that he had let go of the stone. 

After he's done hacking up a lung and what feels like about a third of Lake Valor, he opens a single eye for his vision to fill with yellow and orange. He cranes his neck, confused, and Elesa says, "I gave you the one that floats, you bastard." There's no venom to it, and she smooths the wet hair away from his other eye. "What part of the flooding stopped suggested it was time to do something reckless and hasty? Emmet, that was--" 

"Very stupid. I know," he croaks, blinking Floatzel, Elesa and Empoleon into view. Elesa’s skin is pale and blue underneath, and her eyes are desperately wide until she scrubs at them with the back of a dirty, scraped up hand.  "I'm sorry. I don't want them to hurt themselves or their Pokemon,” Emmet continues, and, as he does, he realizes Sneasel is no longer with Empoleon, but Elesa is quick to catch on and points to his right.  

Lapras bobs nearby with the kids, Sneasel held fast in Lucas's arms. Elesa says, "I might have agreed that they could help once the flooding stopped, by the way." 

Any argument that Emmet has regarding safety feels laughable at this point. He tries anyway, turning Floatzel towards them. "Only if you stay on Lapras." 

Iris retorts with "Only if you don't dive under again." Beneath the glower and puffed up cheeks, she looks cold and frightened. All three of them do. Reading expressions is the best way he knows how to interact with people and their pinched brow, bright-eyed pallor makes evident he had been reckless. 

So Emmet smiles. Soaked to the bone with his own blue lips and teeth that he can't keep still, he likely neither convinces nor comforts anyone. He can only try. "I will not," he says, bowing his head. "I'm sorry for setting a bad example." 

The kids aren't Durant, perhaps, but they help. Emmet is sidelined to a directorial role, atop Floatzel with Sneasel, in his arms, bundled in the coat that Akari abandoned. Chandelure hovers directly between him and Elesa, emitting as much warmth as she can safely manage without burning them or exhausting her stamina. Barry's Infernape joins the kids on Lapras, a tight fit but useful for the extra hands. 

The realization strikes that this could have been what they were meant to do, to wait for the water to fill and then coordinate to dig their way out in the calm that followed, and it would send him into a fit of laughter if breathing didn't feel like drinking knives. Of course, that would mean there'd have to be someone to check his impulses, someone that could stop him in his stubborn tracks before it got them hurt. Elesa had been too easy on him in light of the last few days. Although, after this, Emmet is sure he's lost those privileges. 

Maybe he was wrong. Perhaps there was some puzzle he was missing, or had elected not to look for, in the designs in the floor or the shape of the cavern. Or was the answer beneath the tide of the void, waiting for him to let it wash him away? 

How was he supposed to do this on his own? 

Barry cheers at the same time as Elesa, both heaving aside a rock before going for a high-five that makes Emmet wince given the state of Elesa's hands. 

From beyond the gutted wall of stone, Akari's voice rings clear. "Barry? Is that you? Are you okay?" 

Then Ingo follows, voice thunderous in a way that feels safe and right. "Can you hear us? Are you injured?” 

Three faces swing to look at Emmet with assorted, albeit each clear, messages to stay put. Barry, meanwhile, shouts back, "We're alright! Well, mostly alright! Will be alright? We're working on a way out, so if you both could actually just move, like, now? Out of the--" 

Lucas startles half-way through Barry's meager assertions of their wellbeing and has to clamber over Infernape to slap a hand over his friend's mouth. To muffle Barry's continued attempts to speak, Lucas leans over towards the preliminary opening and visibly struggles to make himself yell. "We have a stable pathway out thanks to Mr. Emmet's planning! To get through faster now that we have a tunnel, we want to send out Pokemon ahead to clear the way! We don't want you two to get caught in the collateral, so please go to the shore!" 

With a snag in his voice clear despite the distance and impediment, Ingo replies, "Understood, safety first! We will make way!" 

On cue, Emmet releases Durant into the platform they've created. He and Barry's Infernape form an unsteady alliance as they piece their way through last layers of rock in the bolstered section, following the pale glow of sunlight that feeds in from the jagged duct that Barry and Elesa cleared out. 

The original plan was to have Infernape use focus blast to rupture the end of the tunnel so that it's wide enough to crawl through, but the outside half of the rubble is under protect, presumably per Azelf. Infernape's attempts bounce off the stone in a flash of fuschia, leaving the remaining effort to be done by mandible and hand. 

In two minutes, 53 seconds, Durant and Infernape clear the way. Without consulting him, the others plan to send Emmet through first. Given the numb deadweight that's spread up his legs, he has little room to argue and is unsure how he'll even manage to crawl through. Floatzel carries him to the landing and he releases Sneasel through first, though she hovers in wait until Emmet confirms he will follow. 

It's taxing. Chandelure leads him, encouraging him with bellsong and bursts of heatless purple light when he slows down. Iris, next in line, assures him that he can take his time, but he knows Elesa won't leave until the kids are out and she spent just as much time in the water as had, with the one exception. So he drags himself through, pulled along by Chandelure’s flame, until he spills out onto the muddy earth beyond the cave. 

It's a less than graceful landing, but he's made it. He pushes up halfway with his hands and scoots backward until he can lean against the wall of the ridge, hoping that it's stable. Thick layers of cloud cover obscure the afternoon sun, but he still has to shut his eyes against the sudden yellow and orange and gray light. Ingo and Akari shout his name, a rush of fabric and footsteps approaching. 

He lets his head loll to his shoulder and the headrush that follows makes Ingo's request for Akari to release Rapidash seem somehow far away. Emmet wonders what good Rapidash would be on an island. Some part of Emmet remembers first aid and crisis training, but issues to do with cold were fairly low on his priority list underground in a city built right off the region's largest desert. His only goal right now is to not pass out this time and so he focuses on taking deep breaths to even out his careening blood pressure. 

"Emmet," Ingo says, very suddenly in Emmet's space, the back of one hand against Emmet's forehead and the palm of the other bracing his neck. Ingo's voice is tight and desperate, so Emmet bats away Ingo's hand and leans forward to rest their forwards together, saying, "That is me."

Ingo’s laugh is crisp and a little broken, and he gathers Emmet into an impossibly gentle hug. "I have to ask you to change into something warm from my kit," he says, making no sign of moving to help that happen. "Then our destination is the hotel, with no stops on our route." 

To the left, there's a shuffle and the sound of someone dropping onto the ground with about as much grace as Emmet had managed. The warm pressure of Ingo's forehead leaves, and Emmet cracks open an eye to see Elesa haul herself up by Akari's extended hand. She sways on her feet and brings a hand up to her face, so Akari guides her to sit beside Emmet against the cliffside. She leans into him, but Emmet flinches away when her weight presses the wet layers like fire into his skin, so they settle for proximity. 

Emmet says, "It’s worse now." 

"Apparently," Elesa says, and then adds through chattering teeth, "Could Rapidash come closer maybe? Or honestly Chandelure is free to just go for it if she'd like. I'm just so fucking cold."

Ingo is repeating the forehead hand check and neck brace procedure with Elesa, counting under his breath alongside what Emmet presumes to be Elesa's pulse. Enrapt with the count, he just shakes his head, but Lucas is hovering nearby and says, "You're too cold for direct heat. If we warm you up carefully, we can have Rapidash carry you back to the hotel." 

"Yeah, you know I figured Emmet would be worse for wear," Barry says, his arm interlocked with Akari's and his eyes pulling from the skyline back to where he and Elesa sit. "But you both look like complete shit."

"Thanks, kiddo," Elesa grumbles, causing Barry to purse his lips to smother a smile. Fair, given that Elesa was far less fearsome when soaked and shivering, but Barry didn't seem the type that would cower even at her worst. 

Ingo shoves a bundle of clothing into his hands, and then sheds his uniform coat and passes that alongside another bundle to Elesa. Iris approaches with a long length of fabric, a dress maybe, that she's pulled from Rapidash's back. With one more long, strained look at them both, Ingo presses himself up to his feet and says, "Once you've changed, this will insulate you from the ground and keep you warm. The safest route is that which ensures we reach the hotel soonest, where we can call a medic if need be. In the meantime, do not hesitate to signal us for aid if need arises."

With that he releases Garbodor to serve as what Emmet’s likely delirious brain considers the world's funniest privacy screen and shepherds the kids out to the shoreline. Emmet doesn't bother to stand up, only dragging himself around so that his back is to Elesa before starting the miserable process of drawing off sopping wet winter layers off one by one. 

The pink sweater that Ingo brought with him from Hisui is warm, especially once piled on top of what must have been every shirt they collectively owned. When he finishes changing, he's still unable to stop shaking but his breathing evens out, less shallow and less sharp. 

A beat after he leans back against the stone, Elesa nudges him to stand so that they can lay out the fabric beneath them. The change in position makes his vision swim, albeit less dramatically than before, but the murky dark at the edges of his vision sends a shock across his system. He spins, too fast, towards Elesa. "Wait. Azelf didn't--Did we fail?" 

She catches him in a hug, grounding him there, and says, "Hey, hey, it did, we're all good. It spoke on the way out, remember? Something about the way ahead."

Right. Chandelure helped. 

Underneath her trance with legs leaden beneath him, the voice returned echoless in the tunnel chamber: "May your steadfast will serve you well in the way ahead. "

Emmet buries his head into Elesa’s shoulder and digs his fists into the fabric of Ingo's tattered coat, hanging slack off her frame. He pulls back and tries to button it closed, like they never wear it, to shield her better from the wind, and only laughs a little when she looks like a teenager swimming in a parent's uniform. He pulls her in close again. 

"You didn't ruin anything," Elesa says into the crown of his head, breath wispy in his hair. "We made it, we're both going to be okay, and you kept the kids dry and mostly warm despite literally their every insistence. We're one step closer to home." 

Emmet only considers home in snatches, while waiting for emails to send or in the black loading screens between battle recordings, too afraid of the impermanence of hope against the advancing loss to linger in the anticipation of it. Now he indulges, free of the surging dark, and imagines their apartment full of photographs, railway tchotchke and their paired conductor certifications hanging up on the living room wall at Uncle Drayden's insistence. Ingo's room, not a guest room or a door he can't quite recall how to see, waits with its walls of textbooks and fantasy novels, with a copy of Civil Engineering and the Nimbasa Subway System on the bedside table with the page marked exactly where Ingo must have left it before he-- 

When it happened. Before whatever it is that nobody can remember, and Ingo was lost. 

Emmet can't think of the next lake, or the trial that waits beneath it, yet. With fingers trembling still, he releases his best friend and thinks for the second time today that he would not be able to do this without her. He says as much this time, thank you insufficient on its own, and she says in return, "I wouldn't be anywhere else."

When they're ready for the others, Emmet peers around Garbodor expecting to find Chandelure and is surprised to find both her and Sneasel in a hidden vigil. He sends Chandelure for the others, and when Ingo deems them warm enough to travel it's by unanimous vote that Emmet and Elesa take Lapras across to the lakefront. 

At the Hotel Grand Lake, they gather again in one room. This time they have shoved the beds together and piled Elesa and Emmet beneath the mass of blankets that Ingo dragged over from his room under threat of calling a doctor otherwise. Emmet sips at a mug of green tea and wears the duvet over his shoulders like a cocoon. Sneasel sleeps in his lap, Emmet confused but not bothered by having been adopted by Ingo's ward. 

Ingo sits on the floor with his right sleeve rolled up while Akari examines his shoulder, listening to Lucas, Barry and Iris recount the trial. Elesa managed five minutes and twelve seconds in bed before she fell asleep curled up with her back against Emmet's blanket heap. 

Outside of the hotel room, the storm Ingo predicted rolls in. Had they delayed earlier that afternoon, would Azelf still have walked Ingo and Akari out into the storm? Would the water have ever stopped rising with the onslaught of rain to replenish the lake beyond the walls? The rain hits the window softly and then in sheets, and Emmet wills himself not to flinch. 

He had always liked thunderstorms. There was no reason for that to change. 

Interrupting Barry, Akari sighs and says, "It doesn't look dislocated. You're probably fine." 

Ingo rolls his arm around his shoulder, a long purple-blue bruise wreathing around the wiry muscles of his upper arm, then yanks down his sleeve. 

For the first time since leaving the island, Emmet finds his voice. "What did you do?" 

Akari doesn't give Ingo the chance. "He somehow thought he'd do a better job than Excadrill and Crustle at digging you out and when that failed figured, hey, we haven't tried just throwing ourselves at a rockslide yet. Why not, right?" She levels a sputtering Ingo with a deadpan stare and then turns to wink at Emmet. "So don't let him lecture you too much about everything. Poor impulse control might just run in the family." 

"Yeah," Iris, the betrayer, says, "but did we mention yet that Emmet decided to dive under the water?" 

Attention swings back towards him and Emmet ducks further under the duvet, envying Sneasel for her total cover and his Pokemon for the safety of their pokeballs. 

Lucas says, "The shock notwithstanding, I'm pretty sure we were all having trouble with the willpower gaps. I was worried that was the whole thing, actually. Having to navigate the cold while our brains weren't really working. So Mr. Emmet and Ms. Elesa took that all on themselves."

Barry nods intently and adds, "Right! Even though it sucked to be sidelined until the end, it could've been that we tried to help while it was still flooding and ended up lost in the brain soup for more trouble than our help was worth. No reason to go for a swim, if you ask me, but still."

Emmet hadn't realized that the kids had been struggling with the gaps--as Lucas called them--as well. Had Elesa been, too? Maybe Lucas was right, and the pull on those memories had been part of the trial. 

He isn't sure whether it matters anymore. 

Ingo climbs onto the bed, fails at lifting his sore arm to put around Emmet, and settles instead for leaning against him, withholding most of his weight. "I'm relieved that you're all alright, all things considered. I only wish that I had been there." Emmet can't make himself turn and witness all the regret and guilt that his brother would wear plain on his face. It wasn't his fault. 

Before he can insist on this point, Ingo says, "We don't necessarily have to pursue the track we have set. Our route to our home station need not include Lake Acuity, with your emotions and willpower once again intact."

The room drops silent, a moment passes, and then they all speak. 

Barry and Lucas face him in tandem, "What?", while Iris and Emmet simply reject the idea entirely: "No."

Akari stands up from her cross-legged seat on the floor and nearly hisses, "Ingo." She strides to the end of the bed, shoving her way in between where Lucas and Barry sit to stare him down. "You promised."

Emmet starts to unbundle himself to intervene, but Ingo bars him with an outstretched arm. "I did. I apologize, Akari. Everyone. Don't mind my momentary derailment, it has been a stressful day."

"If you're even beginning to reconsider you have to tell me," Akari says, and Emmet is ice cold again, his stomach twisting into knots. 

He sheds the duvet, sending Sneasel scurrying out to the end of the bed. "Ingo," he says as he twists to face his brother, attempting to keep the wretched, frenetic panic out of his expression. "What does she mean?" 

When Ingo responds he's quiet, because, as Emmet's learned in the past few days, his brother doesn't raise his voice at people, only in their vicinity. "I have not reconsidered, nor has the thought arisen. I was only suggesting… it's only that…'' He looks from Akari to Emmet and scrubs a hand over his face. Emmet silently counts to three. On cue, Ingo continues, "I have no intention of following the tracks back to Hisui, my only goal is to avoid unnecessary risk."

For once Emmet is glad that his voice is so flat. "You can go back?" 

Lucas is trying to say something, but Emmet is busy factoring in that Ingo leaving again is an option to contend with. While it's true that Ingo had to choose to come home in the first place, that his leap of faith came with an exit route makes Emmet feel nauseous and then numb. He doesn't hear whatever Ingo says in reassurance, or what Akari demands in reply. Collecting the blanket back around his shoulders, he slots that piece of information in with the fragments he had gathered so far, wondering distantly why not knowing tastes as sour as a lie on the way down. 

Emmet might have kept to his thoughts for the rest of the evening, had Lucas not raised his voice for the second time today: "Hey, guys, I'm serious!" 

Attention turns his way and Lucas doesn't cringe back because he’s not looking at them. His phone illuminates his face and Barry is staring over his shoulder at whatever is on the screen. Lucas swallows hard, throat bobbing, and says, "Professor Rowan found out who Akari is." 

Akari looks back to where Ingo and Emmet sit and then goes to bolt.

Chapter Text

The others didn’t expect Akari would be so quick. By the time Ingo scrambles off the mattress and finishes insisting Emmet stay put, Barry and Iris are facing opposite ends of the long hallway with no sign of a direction in mind. Lucas follows Ingo into the hall, his phone slack in his hand, and attempts to explain. "I'm…I'm sorry? I didn't mean to? I just--after the lake I just thought…" 

Ingo gathers what he's getting at and says, "You did nothing wrong. If you do think that there’s any need to apologize, you can do so once we locate her."

Lucas nods faintly and suddenly all three kids are looking at him for direction. 

Right. 

Ignoring the hotel's policy on Pokemon size, Ingo releases Haxorus to keep watch in the room, decisively not hearing Emmet's protests as he shuts the door behind them. Now, the kids. Loathe to separate again, he steadies himself on the reminder that this is a hotel and not the wilderness. Or Lake Valor, for that matter. 

They had opted for rooms rather than a bungalow, meaning there were the six floors, the lobby, and the extraneous facilities to search. Logic dictates that Akari has no business and nowhere to go on any of the other floors. However, knowing Akari dictates, in turn, that they must check anywhere they otherwise wouldn't think to look. 

Barry tears off the moment Ingo asks him to check the hotel grounds, with barely an acknowledgement of the command to not stray onto the nearby routes. Ingo sends Chandelure after him, hoping her incorporeality will help her keep up. 

Iris he turns to search the floors and Lucas to the lobby. There, he would ask the front desk if they had seen Akari and request an escort to search the half-til-closing Seven Stars Restaurant. This left Ingo with the stairwells, maintenance closets, and the roof. All places where it would be best for an adult to take the fall for trespassing. 

Besides, he plays the addled amnesiac fairly well by now. 

After an hour, Iris and Lucas were to collect Barry with Chandelure’s aid and return to the room, for better or worse. 

Ingo reassures them, and himself, that Akari is more than capable of taking care of herself. Even if she shouldn't have to be. 

Safety regulations in Sinnoh require that stairwells, as fire escapes, display facilities maps at all entry points. These maps reveal three stairwells, one central and two on the wings. Because Lucas took the former down to the lobby, Ingo routes his path up the center, over to the left wing and then down, then up the right wing to the roof. The maintenance closets would be last, their locked doors hopefully sufficient deterrents to avoid needing to break any locks in order to find her.

By the end of the first climb, his legs burn, his lungs rattle, and he misses Lady Sneasler dearly. Though he suspects these modern stairs with their sharp corners and arrangement of inclines and flats wouldn't have been her preference. No, she'd have insisted on scaling the outer wall of the building. Especially where Akari is concerned. 

She would be right to, as usual, or at least Ingo suspects as much. If Barry doesn’t find her on the grounds, it’s almost certain that Ingo would find her on the roof. 

If she wants to be found. 

Ingo tucks the thought away with the memories of his Lady, unable to dwell long on the logical end of either track.

Instead, he considers seeing a medic, after all this, about the way his knee pops in the joint as he jogs the length of the sixth floor and then down the left wing stairs. A medic for all it, perhaps. But his knee would be a good place to start. 

His heavy footfalls echo on the dash down and when he closes his eyes Ingo imagines silver and black and yellow alongside a mechanical gale that he cannot place but yearns for with everything he's made of. 

Not now . Not now. He has to breathe the command in cadence with his steps to avoid getting lost in it. 

Crossing the lobby in wide bounds, Ingo holds his hat fast to his brow and wishes for the shield of his coat when even the scant few patrons in the lobby turn his way. The brief glance he spares gives no sign of Lucas or the others. The lobby desk is vacant, which he hopes is a sign of progress towards the restaurant. 

Letting the fire doors slam closed behind him, Ingo takes the left wing stairs two at a time. His bruised arm throbs as it jostles on each propulsive step, a reminder of his limits. 

He was supposed to bring her home, and instead he had threatened to derail. Surely he had known that Akari, who scaled Mount Coronet to face gods, would continue on her own regardless of his cowardice. 

He had the luxury of falling into the path of a twin brother carrying the promise of a history that he could, eventually, make sense of. For Akari, a derailment now is a promise of a home half there. It had been foolish to imagine she would ever leave the journey unfinished. With or without him, Akari would persist. And in doing so, she would restore Ingo's home to him, whether or not he was brave enough to himself. 

Ingo stands rooted on the second to last step. Catching his breath provides the momentary illusion of a reason for pause, but he's rapidly losing the rationale. The echo of his pulse recedes. He mounts the last stair. 

Ingo had only wanted to keep them safe. 

And she had seemed so scared, that moment after Lucas spoke. 

The heavy metal doors creak with disuse as Ingo shoves his way into the rain. The coastal recess that encloses the hotel affords him a view of the storm drawing eastward across the horizon. Miles away, sheets of lightning permeate the night in flashes between the clouds, chased by a low roll of thunder. Between bolts and between breaths, everything else is dark. The steady rain obscures his view, but eventually faint orange flames resolve into view at the northeastern corner. He breaks into a run.

Underneath the utilities enclosure and the awning of Torterra's tree, Akari sits curled up against Rapidash's flank with her Froslass gathered in her arms. When Froslass narrows her eyes at his approach, Ingo stops abruptly and lingers three paces away. 

Akari does not look at him. Ingo releases Garbodor to give him some measure of cover from the rain, and waits. 

Eventually, still fixated on Rapidash's fire as it licks at her crossed forearms, she says, "Froslass, stop it," and then, "Hi, Ingo."

"Hello, Akari." 

She lifts her gaze up to look at him with haunted eyes and Ingo allows himself the briefest surge of resentment at the gods and men that brought them to this. She says, "You'll have to stop calling me that. I made the name up on the spot, remember?" 

"I'll call you whatever you ask me to." 

She hiccups at that, dry eyes betrayed, and Ingo feels helpless as her face crumbles. Rapidash curls around her, resting her muzzle atop Akari’s head in an attempt towards privacy. "I don't know who I am, Ingo. All I've got are these bits of memories and then the person I had to be in Hisui. Am I supposed to let Lucas just tell me? And then what, I'm her again?"

Ingo crosses to her and sits before her on the patch of dry beneath Torterra, Garbodor instinctively returning to her pokeball to prevent crowding. Meanwhile, Akari continues, muffled by fur and fire. "I don't know if I've changed for the better or worse but I'm sure I'm not the same. What if--" her voice cracks, and she curls tighter around her Pokemon. Froslass, no doubt uncomfortable in Rapidash's proximity, nonetheless pulls closer and hums pieces of soothing melodies until Akari can proceed. "What if I can't go back? What if she's gone?" 

She's only sixteen. 

He's at a loss. Ingo knows these anxieties like his own shadow. What is there to say when his own answers have always come up short? The reassurance that she will be loved and accepted no matter how she's changed comes easily, but that alone doesn't cobble together a cohesive identity. Not one without the grief of having shattered in the first place.

"The person you are and the person you were," he starts, adrift in the experience of conjuring words as he goes. "Are less fixed points than they are stations on a circuit, in my experience. At times, you may find that your past self seems beyond reach, and with our trajectories set ever forward it may seem like you can never return to what you once were. And it is alright to mourn what's behind you. 

"But our lives, our identities, have a way of curving around and returning to pass where we started. Not without some adjustments, but we find ourselves again along the way. The person you once were may seem far away right now, but someday, as some new version of yourself, you might find her again. And she'll be no less you than you are right now, as Akari. She'll only be different."

Embarrassed, Ingo had fixed his attention to the hem of his shirt while he spoke. When his thoughts run their course, he draws up his chin to find Akari watching him. He wants to yield to the scrutiny, feeling profoundly inadequate for the role he's found himself in, but forces himself to persist and finish the thought. "Change isn’t the end of the line."

Akari drags the length of her arm across her eyes. Froslass hums again, melody subdued and a little broken, and Ingo wonders if Akari recognizes the tune. He imagines a younger Akari traveling the region with her Torterra, perhaps catching a Snorut in what the Alabaster Icelands eventually became, and he hopes those times were good. He hopes they were kind. 

Barely louder than the surrounding rain, Akari says, "I could have gone home. At Lake Verity. I grew up in the town south of it." 

Ingo remembers how she froze in recognition but refused to change course. 

"Barry, too," she continues. "We met Lucas just outside town. Professor Rowan gave me Turtwig and Barry Chimchar after we promised not to be reckless, ironically enough. Can you believe that Jubilife Village was so close to home and I never knew it?" 

Would it have made a difference? Though perhaps he's biased, his judgment skewed by the weight of the last few days. "Should we reroute to Lake Verity?" 

"Not yet."

"Your mother?" 

A nod. "I don’t think I can survive explaining who I am to her. And I--" She sniffles, pulling her overlong sleeves up around her hands to dab at her face and eyes. Ingo carried tissues, once, for passengers at the end of long days or recovering from tearful goodbyes. He would have to do that again. 

"I just don't understand how you can consider leaving it unfinished, Ingo. I know with willpower and emotions, it's close to remembering, but aren't you starting to remember things now too? I can't take it. It makes me feel so fucking alone when I can remember and they can't."

He's surprised by the ferocity, the heat, in her rising tone. Anger, for his part, hadn’t factored. Whether it's the years he spent with nothing or some fault of his personality, Ingo is only relieved when he can remember. If a little sad to have forgotten in the first place. 

"Do you know what Professor Rowan found?" he asks, his stomach souring when Akari looks away again. "There's no need to discuss further, if you don't want to." 

With a soft smile underlit in warm orange-gold, she says, "Before you got here, I was trying so hard to guess. I wanted to--I want to anticipate it. I don't want to be blindsided by who I'm supposed to be. But I couldn't make myself remember a thing." 

Ingo hums in understanding. Thinking of Lake Verity, of needing to somehow be the right version of himself when under the magnifying lens of years-suppressed grief, he can sympathize. He says, "Lucas was apologetic when we broke off to find you. I'm certain he wouldn't push if you asked him not to." 

She sits up at that. "Wait, it's not just you? The others are looking for me?" 

"Did you think I would be capable of stopping them when it's you at stake?" 

"Ingo. " She draws out his name, scandalized. "You should have told me! It's storming, and it's so late. They were the ones who had to deal with Azelf and Valor. And--" She gasps, and starts up to her feet. "Not Emmet and Elesa, right?" 

Likely too loud, Ingo insists, "Absolutely not. I parked Haxorus between them and the door." Then, "I apologize for not conveying that the others were searching. It felt wrong to rush you." 

Holding out a hand, Akari waits for him to grab hold before chastising him as she yanks him to his feet. "It just seems unlike you. Safety checks and all that. Both you and Emmet, Elesa too for that matter, seem fairly insistent that safety means not letting any of us out of your sight."

"I can trust you and them less, if you would prefer." 

Laughing faintly, Akari forgoes verbal response for a single raised eyebrow. Ingo holds his frown. They stall. 

Ingo flounders first. "I have a contingency in place. Further, Lucas and Iris are exceptionally responsible. While I've only known Barry for the day, I'm certain he'll return to our station when he doesn't find you, or Chandelure will signal me."

Her other brow joins its twin. "First you tried to shoulder check a literal mountainside, and now you've allowed kids to wander alone in a thunderstorm. What happened to the ever responsible Warden Ingo?”

“I accept that I may have been hasty.”  

Pausing first to nuzzle each of her Pokemon, she returns them to their pokeballs. Out from under Torterra's canopy, the rain is less the occasional, harmless drop rolling from a leaf and more of an actual problem. The distant thunder rumbles again, apparent now as Ingo’s focus on Akari abates slightly. 

With a last, shared look of awe at the far-off lightning climbing the dark expanse of sky, they hurry inside. 

It nears the hour mark when they approach the room. Barry and Lucas wait, seated against the wall beside the door. Chandelure trills to announce their arrival, and the moment Akari rounds the corner behind Ingo, Barry is on his feet, then sprinting, to catch her in a hug. Lucas blanches with relief, dragging his cap from his hair and scrunching it over his face. 

After Akari apologizes, Ingo offers to escort them to the other suite so that they can discuss Professor Rowan's discoveries in private. Akari looks at him with complete bewilderment and ushers them all inside. 

The seven of them are enough to cramp a suit made for three, but, of course, it’s never only them. Alongside Haxorus, Chandelure and Sneasel, Emmet has released Galvantula onto the bed between himself and Elesa, who woke up sometime during the search. Their hair billows with static electricity, almost comical when paired with Emmet's wide grin when he sees Akari. 

Akari bows her head and apologizes. Emmet, without missing a beat, says, "That's okay. Most of us have done something stupid today."

"Emmet ," Ingo and Elesa hiss in tandem, but Akari sticks out her tongue at him and retorts, "So can we get into the metrics of our respective bad decisions, then?” 

Ingo feels something unravel in his chest, presses his hand to Chandelure’s glass before returning her, and then proceeds to Haxorus for a scratch under her chin and some soft words of thanks. Once she is in her pokeball, Ingo levels a look at Emmet that suggests he does the same with Galvantula. 

"Nope! No can do," Emmet says, and Elesa elaborates: "She's literally the only thing keeping us awake."

He resists the urge to comment that they should perhaps consider sleeping, then. That his brother and Elesa cared enough for Akari to stay awake until she was found, though perhaps unsurprising, is a comfort. 

Still. Ingo looks to Akari, who is fidgeting with the mussed up blankets at the end of the combined beds. They hadn't resolved whether she would ask Lucas to withhold the information a little longer. By the way that Lucas hovers at the threshold of the hall with his cap wrung in his fist, it's clear that Lucas needs Akari's cue. 

If they're not careful, attention would swing her way again with only her courage to fill the silence. And although courage is something Akari has no shortage of, it needn't be on her shoulders entirely.

Ingo realizes, then, the intuition behind Emmet's glib commentary and behavior, and loves him for it. It reminds him of how, in their battle together on Iris’s device, Emmet's emphatic gestures and conspicuous attacks drew the attention away from Ingo and his team, allowing him the clean, final hit. 

Akari's fists are paler than the blankets they gather. Ingo says, "Akari, the choice is yours. In light of today, however, I suggest that this conversation can wait for the morning." 

Silence holds in the room for a beat, and then Akari nods. "If…I would really appreciate that." 

In the dispelled tension that follows, they set about individual evening routines without protest. An unspoken agreement passes that the days of separate rooms are over. Ingo gathers the remaining sheets and pillows from the abandoned suite along with his, Akari's and Lucas's packs. While Barry and Iris establish claims on separate duvet piles on the floor, Ingo watches Lucas press his phone into Akari's hand "until the morning." 

Elesa and Emmet manage just minutes before they're both asleep on one of the beds, Sneasel curled up between them. There's likely enough room between the one double and one cot for the four kids, but Barry and Iris insist on the floor on claims of sleepover nostalgia. 

Ingo drags his bedding to the threshold between the doorway hall and the room, and props one pillow behind his neck and the other behind the small of his back as a brace. Exhaustion drags at his eyelids and numbs his senses, but he waits until the room falls still before he finally lets himself close his eyes. 

Platform 4 is dark except for the droning yellow safety lights that line the tunnel walls. The chatter of commuters is a diffusive shroud of sound, but Ingo stands alone beside the tracks. Distantly, a train approaches. 

Ingo smooths the clean, tailored lines of his uniform jacket with a jerk at the lapels and stands with perfect posture in wait. There's an itinerary to keep, work to do, and the passenger information display above him is out of service. The lights at his feet begin to flicker, then blink on meter with his heartbeat. 

A familiar flutter of fabric cuts through the disembodied clamor, loud enough to muffle the automated announcer that stutters, garbled, from the speakers overhead. Straightening his hat and holding his attention down the pitch dark of the tunnel, Ingo says, "You're behind schedule, Emmet." 

The footsteps that approach drag on the concrete and stop short of Ingo's side. Loose bolts scrape against metal as someone takes a seat on the decrepit bench behind him. Ingo pivots, sharp, on his heels to face his brother and does not find what he’s expecting. 

Distantly, a train approaches. 

A figure in Ingo’s black and brown colors hunches over on the bench with elbows propped on knees, face obscured by the brim of a frayed uniform cap. The matching coat unravels into tatters at the sleeves and hem, stained and patched and torn again. 

"Excuse me," Ingo says, craning his neck for one last look down the tunnel before striding towards the figure. "Are you alright? I am Subway Master Ingo. Is there any way that I can assist you?" 

The station chatter undulates in volume as the figure lifts his head. Ingo's first instinct shouts Emmet ,  acetic with alarm at the change in his brother, but the familiarity resolves itself into a time-warped reflection of himself. Aged, worn and drawn, but undeniably him. 

The tiling at his feet sloshes, damp with floodwater that reflects the safety lights and illuminates the figure’s mirror-image face from beneath. Ingo swallows hard in the silence. 

"No," his elder self says slowly, eyeing Ingo with scrutiny and then something undefinable. "No, I don’t think you can."

Ingo pulls his shoulders back and juts out his chin, hoping to hide the nervous tic that catches his lower lip between his teeth. Tired eyes regard him affably, and a weathered, gloveless hand pats the bench. 

As Ingo drops into the empty space beside him, he says, "Why are you here?" 

"I am trying to find my way home." 

The desolate platform is dingy and they have years of work ahead of them still, but it's home. It's always had to be home, and Ingo wants to shout and shake this premonition by the shoulders until answers can make sense of the despair that’s pooling in his stomach like bile. 

Instead, he says, "What happened to us?" 

Distantly, a train approaches. The lights along the yellow line flash off-time, one after another. 

When his older self sighs it carries through Ingo on a cold wind. "Our cab met a switch on the tracks without our knowing. It has taken some time to find my bearings and set the route towards this station."

The passenger display flickers on with an electric line and lists strange, foreign destinations. The timetable counts stagger into the years but display down to the second, ticking nearer. Ingo feels his chest seize and latches to the first comfort his erratic thoughts can supply. "But, Emmet. So long as we were together, it could not have--" 

"Emmet did not accompany us on this journey." 

Ingo pitches forward and gathers his head in his hands. His cold sweat sticks to the fabric of his gloves, but his breath is warm at his wrists. He's caught in the torrent of you left him versus I left him, of I was/am/will be alone. The LED numbers have burnt onto his retinas and he’s unable to stop himself from doing the math. 

2,449,296 minutes and 32, 31, 30 seconds. 

He will be 27 when he departs. 

That's not enough time. 

"You don't remain alone. There are people that care for you there. Your new partners fight well by your side."

His team, too, then? The Pokemon he had raised since childhood, abandoned entirely? "That…that sounds like another life," he manages, palms pressing haloes into his eyes. "How could you have stayed long enough--how could we have done anything but try to return?" 

"We forget.”

Distantly, a train approaches. Ingo stumbles to his feet. The din of the station has receded now, cut off like when the platforms are isolated by heavy metal barriers in order to complete repairs. 

Alone with himself on the platform, Ingo indulges his tendency for volume and shouts until it echoes off tunnel walls. He believes that he's asking why, but a growing part of him already knows the answer. Or the lack of it. 

He is nearly 24 and his future has collapsed into a single juncture. With the certainty of dreams, as that is what this must be, he knows there's nothing he can do to change his course. This is not real, and he cannot leave here to find Emmet. Elesa and his uncle can’t join them to do everything in their power to put a stop to this. All he can do is look at the man he is supposed to become and beg. "But we remember again? That's how you're here, why you're trying to find home. Don't you know that it's here? Don't you realize that you've reached your station?"

His elder self draws his ruined hat lower over his brow and only says, "It is not so simple."

Distantly a train approaches, forever locked in this perpetual moment to play the part of a precipitous metaphor. Ingo cannot wait for it any longer. Without another word to his future, he exits the platform and climbs towards Gear Station. 

The atrium greets him with Nimbasa sunlight flooding in through the tall, south-facing windows. If he weeps then, there's no one but himself to see. He won’t remember, come morning. 

"Your trainer ID says your name is Dawn. And, uh, you're Sinnoh's last Champion." 

Lucas delivers the news with an anxious catch in his voice and Ingo almost misses it, busy repeating the name Dawn is his head. Barry and Iris, however, drop stunned silence in a matter of milliseconds in order to yell incoherently in awe. The clatter of cutlery and the ambient chorus of conversation halts, briefly, as the other restaurant-goers look toward their table. Ingo shrinks into his seat, leaving Elesa to hush them with a single, hard stare. 

Dawn, then. She had asked when they sat down for everyone to use her given name in the hope it would help her remember. Her name is Dawn. 

Lucas continues. "You're from Twinleaf Town, same as Barry. You completed the League Challenge a few years ago, so technically you've been standing Champion for awhile. It looks like after, you know, Miss Cynthia fell back into the position and nobody has won against her since." 

"Well I've tried, " Barry says, skewering the nearest vegetable on his plate with his chopsticks. "Makes sense that my best friend would wreck her, though. This is the coolest!" 

Seated across from her friends, between Ingo and Elesa, Dawn blinks at Lucas. She carefully sets her bowl of rice back on the table and lays her chopsticks next to it. "Champion like Iris is?" Iris and Barry nod intently. "What does that mean? What did I do?" 

Iris hums, and says, "Well I'm not sure how it works in Sinnoh, but back home my responsibilities are pretty evenly split between facing off challengers and doing PR things for the Unova League. Sometimes I lose the title, usually to the same guy, but then I beat him again later to take it back." 

As she continues, Ingo focuses on setting aside portions of his meal to bring up for Emmet per Elesa's instructions on what he likes. Emmet had not roused this morning despite Ingo’s efforts, sending him halfway to the lobby to call a medic before Iris explained he hadn't slept the night before. Elesa, later, added that not sleeping had been a long-standing issue for Emmet. They agreed that, absent a fever, they would leave him to rest. In his stead and for his peace of mind, respectively, Ingo left Sneasel and Chandelure behind. 

As Iris closes on the insistence that she and Dawn would need to battle when this is over, Elesa leans back against her chair and says, "I think I'm starting to understand why we don't remember." When they turn to her, she nurses her cup of tea in both hands and doesn't seem inclined to elaborate. 

Lucas presses. "Because people would notice a missing Champion?"

After a long sip of her tea, she sets the cup softly back onto the table and leans around Dawn to point at Ingo. "Back home, your brother is a respected public figure, the leader of one of Unova’s premier battle facilities, and related to two members of the Unova League. Throw me in there for an honorary third." Softening as she shifts towards Dawn, she adds, "And the Champion is a big deal. Not to mention a Champion who supported development on a Pokedex with a best friend whose father is a Frontier Brain for one of this region's battle facilities."

Barry startles at this, but Ingo finds Elesa's tendency for preemptive research perfectly unsurprising, which is a comfort. The intricacies of the networks at play are still foreign to him, but he's beginning to follow her logic. 

Neither of them would be easily missed. Unless. 

"What I'm saying," Elesa drawls, scanning the group. "Is that there are two regions with powerful and well-connected trainers that would have cared that you were gone. That would have tried to get you home."

Iris gasps, and veers diagonally across the table to yank at Ingo's sleeve. "Like Dad said on the Xtrans," she says, wide-eyed and on the cusp of something that Ingo is just catching up to. "The two days. The email to Professor Rowan. Emmet's weird contact!" 

"That number you had me look up after your call with Drayden? What does--" Elesa stops herself mid-sentence, and pinches the bridge of her nose with a sigh. "What did Emmet forget to tell me?" 

A combined effort between Iris and Ingo brings the others up to speed about Drayden's email to Professor Rowan and the two days between Ingo disappearing and everyone forgetting. 

Elesa pales, the dark circles underneath her eyes showing through her makeup, and she stands up abruptly. Her hands flat on the table, her tea and pastry half-finished, she takes a deep breath. "If you'll excuse me. I just need a moment. Some of the emotions," she flails one hand in a vague gesture at her chest, "make more sense now. With that. And that's not a conversation for right now."

As she starts towards the exit, she brushes a hand over Ingo's shoulder and squeezes lightly. Ingo hates himself for being thankful that they had only remembered for two days. An old refrain, Mesprit’s voice now, ‘ It is easier without it’ , rings truer with each break in their collective facades. 

Lucas redirects the conversation. "Iris, you said that Mr. Drayden had asked Professor Rowan about Dialga, Palkia, and Giratina, right?" 

She nods. "At least in the email he shared with us. I don't know if there were others. He's big into legends and might've had more than one lead." 

Lucas chews at his lower lip and looks from Barry beside him across to Dawn. Barry elbows him to force him forward. "The central database for the Sinnoh Dex has complete and recent entries for Mesprit, Azelf, Uxie and, uh, Giratina. It also has partial entries for Dialga and Palkia. It wasn't me, and it wasn't Barry. That, um, leaves you, Dawn." 

Setting aside his cutlery, Ingo pushes forward his plate of piled carbohydrates for Emmet and says, "I don't follow your trajectory. Dawn was unmatched at capturing Pokemon in Hisui, surely it's no surprise she was as skilled in her own time, as well?" 

His neutral frown must have held too stern, as Lucas flinches and begins to backpedal. "No, no, I'm not explaining myself well. I think that's exactly it. If there's a why to it, that is. Just give me a second to try to get it together." 

Taking a cue from Elesa, he inhales, draws up his green tea for a long sip, and closes his eyes to steady himself. "Ms. Elesa is right about the Leagues having the influence to try and find you," he says, the tremor in his voice tapering off. "But what about you, Dawn, if you had all your knowledge of Sinnoh? Maybe I'm biased, but not every Champion is also a researcher, and that's what Arceus had you doing, right? Catching Pokemon so that the people of Hisui would better understand them?" 

Dawn hums noncommittally, then props her elbows on the table and stares out the window. She hadn't spoken since asking Iris to clarify about the Champion's role. A look passes between Barry and Lucas, and Barry shrugs with a half smile and a go on gesture. 

"I think no memory and all instinct was exactly what Arceus needed from you," Lucas says, voice surer now with steel underneath. "Your amnesia kept you in Hisui to fulfill Arceus's purpose, and your instinct led you back to Pokemon that you had already met to put everything right again. To fix it." 

"Fix what?" 

Ingo can't tell who asks over the cacophony of his own thoughts falling in place. Lucas looks to him with sympathy years older than he has any right to, and Ingo knows--has always known--but still feels the need to tear himself from the table. But he's the adult here, so he stays, and hadn't that been the point of it? The cover of being responsible, being the adult, once insisted he would escort Dawn home in response to her underlying drive to save him, too. Regardless of whether he had deserved saving. 

When Dawn lifts her head to look his way, Ingo says, resolute, "My failure. You’re saying that Arceus had not anticipated my amnesia and everything that followed was a result. It had to retroactively erase the memory of me in Unova, then later took Dawn and subsequently your memories of her."

"That's awful." Behind him, Elesa's voice is the only warning of her approach. Ingo startles, pulling on the arm of his chair to twist towards her. Some selfish part of him had hoped to face his culpability in parts, but perhaps it was naive to assume that he'd be lucky. Elesa steps passed him to her abandoned seat and lukewarm tea, and manages to look composed as she asks, "But why the years between, then? Beyond the horror of sending an even younger person into the past. Lucas said it's been a few years since you took the Champion's seat. Why wait?" 

A reasonable concern, and not necessarily one Ingo has to answer to. The logistics of time travel still made little sense to him. If Arceus had been able to drop them back in their time on the exact day that Emmet and the others arrived to Sinnoh, why not send them to the moment they were taken? Why take Dawn while she was still a teenager? Was there something to them as they were then, as they are now, that matters? Would it not be better for this all to have been nothing more than a terrible moment, little more than a bad dream that they could move on from? Did Arceus even have a reason? 

"It's because of Jubilife," Dawn says, and Ingo is lost enough in the allure of the questions that stifle his self-loathing that he doesn't realize, at first, that she's finally spoken. "I don't know why it waited between Ingo and me, but it sent me to the time it did because that was when Jubilife Village would have been most open to me. It was somewhere that I would be safe." 

Both Ingo and Lucas start to speak, but Barry swats his hands on the table to silence them with a ceramic clatter. For the second time, the surrounding restaurant quiets and a server picks up speed in their direction. Barry manages to look sheepish as he apologizes, first to the group and then to the server at Elesa's wordless command. 

"Sorry, sorry, sorry" He says again, sincerest when directed to Dawn. "I just could see it in their faces that we could keep at this for ever . Don't you think it's, like, not really the point? Not in general. It's definitely important to know why and how this happened, but right now I don't think it's the point." He fumbles with his phone, swiping down and then turning the screen towards Ingo, Dawn, and Elesa. Ingo is growing more familiar with these devices, and recognizes that Barry has two blocks of notifications, one under "Mom" and the other "Dad", with 12 and 27 new messages respectively. "My parents have been at this all morning. There's a bunch of photos of me with a best friend all of the sudden, one that I went on my League Challenge with. We gotta do something about the people that are suddenly seeing evidence of a Champion they don't remember. Bet the Subway is starting to see double, too."

Barry has a point. He knows it, too, by the way he straightens his shoulders and scrunches up his nose at the stuck silence that follows. 

Dawn sighs. "If I get a vote, I want to avoid dealing with any of the Champion stuff until after Lake Acuity," she says as she flattens what's left of her rice into the wall of its bowl with rapt focus. "In order, just to get it out there, I want to resolve the memory loss, go see my mom, cry it out, and then I'll consider dealing with the League. Is that an option?" 

It's Elesa's turn to tap at her device. When she finds what she's looking for, she tilts her head to look at Dawn and says, "Your vote is the only one that matters, really. I think we can pull it off, but we'll need to involve one more person. The local Champion that Lucas mentioned? I know her, and I think she'd be able to help. What do you think?" 

Ingo considers for himself as Dawn swirls her chopsticks around in what was at one point a delicately dressed salad. The appeal of another involved party was minimal at the point where one's identity sat so precariously, as it seemed to for Dawn at this moment. Certainly not a competitor, someone who she had met and bested at the height of her former self's aspirations. At the same time, this wasn't something that they could resolve on their own. Not without changing course. The alternative was to clear out the wreckage in the aftermath, a direction antithetical to Dawn's turn to rest and recover at the end of this current journey. Were Ingo able to leverage his own contacts, namely Emmet's, namely his uncle, all tracks may lead to one depot: The top of the Sinnoh League. 

So it does not surprise Ingo when at the end of a long, tired breath Dawn says, "Okay. Let's do it." 

It's not until the next morning that they set out again. Emmet takes until the height of the afternoon to resemble life again, and by then they have a queue of calls to make before dinner. Nobody is eager for a late night trek this time. 

Well, perhaps not eager, but Ingo is no stranger to the steady waves of abortive impatience that emanate from Dawn when she thinks the others are not paying attention. The little gestures, tearing at hangnails and teeth pulling at the inside of her cheek, remind Ingo of shared glances at the umpteenth Hisuian lecture on the dangers of wild Pokemon as if they, themselves, had not helped shape the parameters by which Hisui understood them. 

There's no assurance, here, that if Dawn plays her part it will give way to the freedom of the open wilds. The journey ahead was bound to schedule and fixed to the tracks, moreso still following Professor Rowan's guidance over the phone to keep a low profile from here out. 

Thus, Ingo collects his worn jacket and folds it around his hat, where it joins his meager effects at the base of his pack. It's unlikely to be recognized here, Emmet had insisted as much, but his inconspicuous, time-worn uniform would not be a loose end where Dawn’s wellbeing was involved.

Over the remaining course of Rowan’s input, Emmet disappears into the bathroom after a whispered exchange with Dawn that Ingo, at the time, does not note. He emerges later with Ingo's Pearl Clan tunic, hand-washed free of Valor's grime and dried via Rapidash. 

Ingo knows now that gestures convey more between them than words. 

Drayden is a consummate professional when they call. His report includes the names of the League members and Nimbasa Subway personnel that he has enlisted to support managing the situation in Unova. Ingo can recall the names, but not faces, of just Lenora and Skyla, while a haze of green and gold alongside warm, certain pride follows the list of subway staff. Some of Emmet's emails, it turns out, have been aimed at preparing the trusted personnel for the outcome of Valor, earning Emmet a biteless comment about actually explaining himself for once via Elesa. 

When Drayden expects a report in return, Emmet immediately excuses himself and marches out into the hall with Sneasel in tow. Iris offers, but Ingo is able to clear the acid from his throat and explain the just. Drayden's countenance doesn't betray any change but his voice is low when he says, "I would hope that this was a consequence of the nature of willpower and Uxie's trial involves no such needless endangerment."

Drayden refers to him as Subway Master again, when they part, and Ingo remembers to salute in return. Ingo finds himself looking for how the wrinkles around his uncle's eyes give away his smile in a habit that feels older than memory. 

Barry finishes arguing--or Ingo believes that they're arguing--with his father on the balcony around the time that Elesa set to call Cynthia. She sets her device on the end of the bed, explains that she's setting the video off for Dawn’s privacy, and taps the call button. 

After Drayden's formality, Ingo is mildly surprised when Elesa opens the call saying: "Hi! I need your help with some Pokemon fuckery. If it helps, it involves legendaries and Sinnoh's history. Thoughts?" 

Cynthia is cordial and toes the line of pressing for details and respecting the delicacy of the situation with the practice of a dancer. Elesa, Iris and Dawn prepared the details in advance, focusing on the Lake Spirits' influence and promising particulars on Hisui when they met in person. A pertinent question as to Elesa's involvement leads to a brief detour towards Ingo's role, which they leave at his name, position, and that his situation is being handled. 

They agree to meet her in Celestic Town on the route to Lake Acuity, and Cynthia swears in the meantime to do everything in her power to ward off interested parties and keep the League data on Dawn under lock and key. 

Her voice is warm but confident. Ingo feels more secure with their new ally having at least heard her speak, even if they had not been properly acquainted yet. 

From there, the tracks ahead resolve themselves. Over room service that Emmet ordered during his bout of cowardice with Drayden, Lucas shakes out his map and starts setting a course. 

Were it Ingo alone, the trip from the Mirelands to the northern reaches of the Alabaster Icelands would take the better part of four days, if on foot without Lady Sneasler. The cleared routes between here and Snowpoint may cut their time, but said routes aren't altogether direct. If they pushed through the night, they could arrive at Celestic in a day, but Barry confirms that Route 210 isn't much changed from the wooded canyon at Coronet's door that Ingo remembers. 

And so the next morning, they weave through the grassy stretch of path that cuts between the eastern Coronet Foothills and Lake Valor towards Veilstone City. With the storms well past, sunlight cuts through the surrounding woods in slices of gold that catch the condensation from Ingo's breath as it dissipates into air. Dawn walks beside him, more herself today, pointing out stray Stunky and Psyduck that make way as Emmet, Iris, and their pair of Archeops lead the charge. 

The smattering of trainers keep their distance, and any gawking ends up, as intended, on the foreign Pokemon and their boisterous partners at the front. One young man at the far edge of the route tries to catch Ingo's attention, yelling "Cool shiny Sneasel!", but Ingo is thankful this once for his neutral expression’s tendency to dissuade friendly strangers. 

Without his coat to burrow in, Sneasel dashes between their group and the edges of the wild grass patches that grow under cliff shadows. It reminds Ingo of daybreaks in the Highlands, of the Lady with her kits and foraging for breakfast with Gliscor. If he closes his eyes, the dirt and day-old damp still smells the same, the air heavier with this mechanical age but still crisp, cold off the leeward side of Mount Coronet. The ancient firs that crest the eastern treeline preceded his days in Hisui and would succeed him still. Had he the time, could he stray to the south and find where he caught Tangela? 

When Dawn knocks shoulders with him, catching him smiling, she asks, "Remembering?" 

"Not quite," he corrects, running a hand down to smooth the Clan sigil. "I’m ensuring that I won't forget."

Chapter Text

Meager light pours in from the high clerestory windows that line the north and south walls of the Veilstone City gate as Emmet hurries the kids, sans Lucas, inside. The fair skies had not held past their early morning hike to Veilstone, and ten minutes into their wait on Route 215 the cold damp suspended in the air gave way to deluge. There was no avoiding the rain if they were to proceed today, but they could at least stay dry while waiting for Ingo, Elesa, and Lucas to return with camping gear for the trek to Lake Acuity. 

The kids gather, grumbling, in a nook in the far corner of the gate, Barry leaning up against the wall and bouncing his foot while Iris and Dawn settle on the floor so Iris can finish braiding Dawn's hair.  

Dawn, not Akari, and Sinnoh's champion at that. Champion at age twelve, and Hisui’s hero by sixteen. She spent one year in Hisui to Ingo's four. Four and a half. Four, six months, and 23 days. 

What time had it been in the forest south of Valley Windworks?

Would knowing the seconds help? 

There's little point, Emmet supposes, in tracing back to the exact moment when their next stop would restore their memories. Yet, Emmet wonders if he can brace himself in these stolen minutes of pause en route. Would anticipating it lessen the blow of the challenge that waits at Lake Acuity? 

Hadn't he learned by now that there's no anticipating anything? 

"Emmet, you're pacing," says Dawn, shifting on her tailbone to face him as Iris pins the last braid in a tight coil at the nape of her neck. Emmet understands, now, as with her long hair concealed, she less resembles the girl Chandelure found off Route 205 and could not be mistaken for the one in photographs and press coverage covering her ascent to Sinnoan fame years before. Along the same line, he suspects the oversized hoodie, borrowed from Elesa when they arrived at Veilstone, had little to do with the chill. 

The news of who she was--is--wears on her like days without sleep. It reminds Emmet of Ingo's apprehension the other night, carrying with it his suggestion that they leave this journey unfinished. 

It left him catastrophizing, wondering whether the blow of having to fight and struggle to belong, again, to the homes stolen from them eroded at their resolve until only uncertainty remained in its place. 

Which poses the question that's been eating at him ever since he woke up in Valor’s aftermath with clarity unexpectedly replacing the constant headache he had carried here from Nimbasa: 

Why? Why had Arceus taken them? 

To hear Lucas tell it, it was because Dawn was a powerful trainer capable of capturing Legendary Pokemon. Which, evidently, Hisui needed. There's a taste of predestination to it that goes down sour. Did the Pokemon that Dawn caught, which marked her as Arceus's target, recognize her? To Dawn, those encounters in the before were her first. However, for the Lake Spirits and the Creation Trio, they had met in a past that she wasn't old enough to have experienced yet. Of course, that's assuming that even before Arceus plucked Dawn from her time, that past had already happened. 

Which would mean there would have been evidence, before even Dawn existed, of her role in Hisui. 

Which would mean that there could have been evidence, too, of a Warden Ingo before he was stolen and everyone forgot. 

Could there have been a route where they had learned and stopped it? What would have changed? The selfish instinct to preserve Ingo, and himself, from this fate isn't so strong that Emmet would condemn Dawn to facing Hisui and its consequences on her own. 

Except, he was missing pieces still. What reason is there for this hidden beneath careful obfuscations and we can discuss it later? 

Willpower courses through his veins like wildfire and Emmet needs answers. 

"Still pacing, Emmet." It's Iris this time, on her feet and reaching out to grasp his forearm. 

He stops, his train of thought veering from the rails, and says, "I am trying to understand." 

Barry groans, leaning his head back against the wall to stare at the rain-splattered glass above. "I can't believe how much you guys just want to think about everything. How did you even make it to Lake Verity without me? I can’t believe you made it out of the lab, once the Professor was in on it." 

Iris lets go of his arm, and Emmet restarts his circuit, saying as he picks up pace, "I would prefer to act. I would prefer to ask the precise questions that get me the answers I want. I can't. Unless Dawn’s phone has a direct line to Arceus?" 

Dawn laughs and retrieves an entirely ordinary looking phone from her pockets. "It was only ever one way. Besides, it stopped being the Arc Phone once we got back. Now it's just a normal cell phone with a dead battery." 

"Arceus possessed your phone and didn't give it back to you fully charged?" Barry asks, swinging his bag over his shoulders to dig around in the front pockets. The charger he finds has the wrong connection, though Dawn doesn't seem bothered by the missed opportunity. 

With a small shrug, she says, "It feels like a lot the whole returning us home process was overlooked, being honest."

On the pivot of a turn, Emmet starts the motion to point at Dawn, but hesitates, the gesture feeling too direct. Instead, he comes to a stop and asks, "You said before that Arceus wouldn't have sent you back without you asking. It didn't plan on sending you home?" 

Dawn pushes up from the wall and steps past him, peering around the corner towards the Veilstone-side doors. "I didn't think so. Given that it's making us do all this work to fix the mess of it, I think Arceus was content with how things were after the rifts closed and Volo was dealt with."

That name again. The one from the beach, when Dawn talked about the world ending, and of exile and imprisonment. Emmet bites at his cheek, trying to decide whether to press or wait to ask Ingo. Dawn didn't deserve to be pressured into unspooling whatever private nightmare she left behind her half-answers. 

Ingo didn't either. Emmet would need a script, and need to practice, to ask in a way that didn't demand. 

Emmet knows, distantly, that his reluctance belonged to the ache of abandonment that he lacked the memories to wholly understand. But knowing now that Ingo had the option to leave is cause enough for Emmet to proceed with caution. With care. 

There was a difference, after all, between knowing someone and feeling that you did. 

"We keep describing what we're doing as fixing things," Iris says, and Dawn and Emmet both look at her in turn. She straightens under their scrutiny, but then deflates with a short sigh. "I just can't help but think of all of Dad's stories. It doesn't seem right, I guess. Most of the time Legendary Pokemon don't do things without a reason. Why not just… tell the Lake Guardians to give us our memories back? Why the challenges?" 

Emmet scrapes his chipped, bruised fingernails on the inside of his palms and thinks about the cold. 

"I thought the challenges back in Hisui were to prove myself capable to the Lake Spirits before I faced Palkia and Dialga. But what do we have left to prove?" 

"Are you sure," Barry draws out as Emmet catches up with the implications of what Iris and Dawn are suggesting. "Are you really sure there's a reason and Arceus isn't just, like, fucking with us?" 

Dawn glares at him, but there's humor in it, eyes lighter now from under her pinched brow. "I may be a little bit upset about everything, but I still don't believe that Arceus would want to do harm, not purposefully. It’s not cruel."

Emmet tries not to laugh. They are well past that, aren’t they? Harm is in every inch of this, inadvertent or not, and the decision to make them fight to recover the memories that they never should have lost wasn't inadvertent. No, Emmet is inclined to believe there's intent in this. Another why to be interrogated and understood. 

What did they have to prove? Is Arceus preparing them, or is it trying to prevent something? Which option is worse?

Elesa's voice, calling down the length of the gate, interrupts the comment bubbling beneath his restraint. Emmet and Dawn step past the corner of their nook to find Elesa leading Lucas and Ingo forward with new gear and raincoat hoods drawn overhead. Or, raincoats for Elesa and Lucas and centuries-old garment with a silly hood for Ingo. Upon seeing them, Sneasel leaps from Ingo's shoulder to bound towards Emmet, evidently just to shake out her rain-soaked fur in his face once atop his shoulder.  

Any spiraling line of questioning gone, just like that, in a soggy instant. 

Ingo sputters apologetically, but Emmet wipes the water from his face and grins, snatching Sneasel into a cradled hold and saying, "Archeops is going to have a fit once he realizes he's been replaced as the team baby."

Rounding Emmet to clasp a newly purchased sleeping bag to his pack, Ingo says, "This one had five siblings. I am certain she will be able to share." After a pause, he adds, "Besides, I can faintly recall Archeops, or Archen perhaps, having to share the apartment with at least three separate clusters of Joltik over the course of a year."

Ingo tugs on the straps to ensure the sleeping bag is secure, and then freezes. Emmet tries desperately to remember a version of those moments that included his brother. Meeting Archen, newly resurrected in Nacrene City by Lenora. Hatching the Joltik with cross poison, finally, and finding electric yellow bristles in the rug and linens for a year after. It's only ever him. Always alone. 

Emmet catches himself spiralling, pulls his smile wider, and spins to face Ingo. "You remember! That was six years ago. I was balancing out my team for the Battle Subway launch trial."

Ingo stares for another second, as if stalled at the memory, then closes his eyes and exhales slowly. Arms full of Sneasel, Emmet can't free his hands to lay one on his shoulder or press his arm, any grounding gesture requiring at least one hand. So he waits. 

The others busy themselves with rearranging new equipment and give the twins a small circle of space. Ingo looks at him again, present this time, and smiles back. It's not like his smiles during their battle, or the odd grin when he laughs, and it's almost like the years have fallen from his features. He says, "I apologize. It's the first time I've remembered our home with real clarity. I--" His voice catches and he collects himself for a stalled second, scratching Sneasel behind the ear feather. She purrs under their combined attention. "How much I missed it caught me unprepared. We can return to our scheduled preparations without further delay." Intent to avoid the topic, Ingo folds back in on himself with a tight nod. Who he’s trying to convince, Emmet’s uncertain. 

Emmet wonders whether he’d win against Arceus, if given the chance. 

He wants to remember. Both for Ingo and for himself. For the first time, he can almost understand Mesprit's suggestion that it would be easier without the emotions. The frayed ends of a lifetime of love and years of unspent grief are a harbinger of knowledge that has fallen beyond his reach. The fear that knowing exactly what he had lost, what had been taken from him, was second to how desperately Emmet wants to be able to look at Ingo and say that he remembers, that Ingo had been there with him, that they had been together. 

Instead, he says, "We'll be back soon. I promise." 

The only way is forward.  

Route 215 greets them with sheets of rain, carrying eastward on the wind as they cross the threshold onto the slick stone path that runs up to the gate. Ingo leads with Lucas beside him, the latter hunched low under his hood but waving his hands in animated conversation that Emmet cannot hear over the rainfall. Following a few paces behind him, Emmet can catch the snippets of the conversation between Iris and Dawn about the League Challenge. Emmet isn’t listening. He is busy, instead, watching an Abra flit in and out of view as they pass through patches of wild grass and trying to guess where it'll next appear through the torrent. 

It appears opposite of the turns they take around reaching fir tree barriers that guide them along a winding path slowly uphill. On the fourth such turn, Emmet narrows his eyes at a point in the far patch of grass and directs Sneasel to look the same way. 

Abra appears. 

Emmet makes a face. 

Pop! The Abra startles, vanishing in a swirl of mist. Sneasel's churr at his ear sounds like a snicker.

Iris, closer to his elbow than he realized, giggles softly. Dawn says, "If you're bored, you can tell me about your League Challenge. You went on one?" 

"Yup! No Pokedex research, but I challenged all the Gyms. It let me win against Uncle Drayden with real stakes." 

Iris laughs again, then says, "It took you three times to win, right? Your Pokemon weren't a good match." 

Emmet grins, all teeth, turning to find them both staring up at him benignly from beneath their drenched hoods. "It was a very long time ago. Are you sure Uncle Drayden's memory is trustworthy?" 

"Want me to call him and ask?" 

Emmet picks up pace. 

Further down the route, Ingo diverts past a stonecut staircase leading to a zigzagging overpass of wooden bridges that shudder in the wind, opting instead for rain-slick but otherwise grounded ledges. Trudging ahead of him, apparently no stranger to the elements at their worst, Dawn tosses a glance over her shoulder and asks, "Did you take on the Elite Four, then, Emmet?" 

Emmet's left foot slips, near to sending him skidding down the ledge without Dawn's quick reflexes catching him by the elbow. Sneasel snickers again. Recovering his composure with a little shake of his tweaked ankle, he says automatically, "Nope. Can't have two Champions." 

Dawn's grip on his arm tightens. "What was that?" 

He turns to find her staring at him with her mouth caught agape. What did he say wrong? "You can't have--" 

Oh . 

Pain pulses just behind his eyes, sending a wave of nausea that wavers his vision. Emmet hisses, bringing his hand to pinch at his brow before stopping himself and letting the hand drop back to his side. He pulls together a disarming smile and says, "We must have done our League Challenge together."

"Did you remember?"

His smile falters, wobbling as he presses his lips together to wait for the right words to come to him. "Sorry," he starts, shrugging tightly. "I didn't. I know that I didn't take on the Elite Four, and I know that's why. I don't remember why that's why. Even if I can guess." 

Elesa and Barry are catching up. Dawn watches him, expecting more, and he has nothing to give. As far as Emmet can tell, their amnesia operates like rails. Without a trigger, a switch, it'll continue on the main-line past the point of remembering, but the trigger is a physical thing that can shift the rails and redirect them onto the right trajectory. Dawn’s and Ingo’s brains have the capacity to travel the diverging tracks towards their original stations. Emmet's experience, by comparison, is that his wheels would derail on the junction and stall out there at the moment between forgetting and recognizing that there’s something to forget. That is, would derail. Now in the aftermath of Lake Valor, it's like the switch no longer operates. There's the certainty, the way shaping your life in tandem with another person feels, but no amount of insisting prevents him from splitting the switch and traveling through in the unintended direction, diverting him invariably towards derailment, no memory to be found, no station to reach. 

If left to it, Emmet will run himself aground on that circuit. Around and around until his wheels degrade and scrape across the rails in flashes of electric that'll tear him asunder from the bottom up. 

And what's the good in that? 

So Emmet resolves into optimism, into action, and says, "It's okay! We'll remember soon. Until then, I know what's missing. I have it easy. So it's best to hurry onward so that we can fix it for everyone else." 

Furrowed brow aside, Dawn leaves it there. 

They press on. 

It's two hours into the attempt that Emmet gives up on sleep. Camping, it turns out, is sensory misery. They set up about a third of the way through Route 210, at the point the sunset slipping behind the westward mountainside wall receded into dusk. The din of resident camping experts Dawn, Ingo, and Barry setting up tents and preparing a fire pit was comfortable enough to lull Emmet into a false sense of ease. It was only after nightfall, sequestered to tents and sleeping bags, that the constant Hoothoot and Kricketune chorus combines with the wind battering at the plastic of their tents, pairing perfectly with the way his sleeping bag makes every inch of skin exposed to it itch. 

This will not work. 

As silently as he can manage, he climbs out of the sleeping bag and over Iris and Elesa to reach fresh air. The fog that pools to the north of their camp has given way slightly under nightfall, exposing the grassy periphery of their campsite in the sputtering firelight. 

Ingo sits at the treeline, watching the route past the tents like a sleepless sentinel. The hypocrite. 

Emmet trudges over and drops to the ground beside him. "What happened to resting our engines for the journey ahead?" 

The withering glance Ingo levels him with suggests that he does not have a compelling answer. They sit in silence, watching the wind suffuse the wide grassy sea around them, until Ingo says, “Would you tell me what our home is like?” 

After the lump that gathers in his throat wanes, Emmet does. 

He starts with their apartment, bought after the promotion to Subway Master. After the first Battle Circuit pilots were a resounding success, renting became a thing of the past. Emmet isn't a fan of heights, so they live on the second floor, all the easier to rush in and out of between odd shifts and when emergencies demand a leadership presence at the station. With exacting detail, he describes the floor to ceiling bookshelves that they inherited from their parents' home, fully stocked with civil engineering manuals, treatises on battle strategy, and genre novels that Emmet never reads but would still buy whenever the local shops have a streetside sale. Frames line the walls of Ingo's room, full of cheap drugstore photo prints from a trip to Kalos and Galar, almost entirely depicting their transit infrastructure and aged architecture. Emmet's favorites were all the pictures of the Corviknights that serve the Galar Taxi fleet. Ingo must have taken a photo of every station in Wyndon. 

Then Nimbasa. Describing the city felt impossible, when so much of it was in the sensory details rather than its structures. As much as it's the long avenues lined with towers that guide the eye out to the waterline, it's the way the streetlights and signs reflect in neon and gold on the pavement after it rains. It's how there's never complete quiet, so he can't help but feel alive amidst the clamor. Emmet tries to put to words the way the air feels different there, like it has purpose, and how the same route would always feel a little different from the last journey down the familiar roads. 

"Gear Station is… It's home. To me. You can't miss it. The building is right at the heart of Nimbasa, and older than everything around it. It has south-facing windows that flood the concourse with light, which I'm told are ver y hard to clean. We have offices up there, but I mostly work down on the terminal. If I'm not on the trains. The eight lines all originate and terminate at the Gear Station depot. Ah, wait, how about…" Emmet wanders the edge of camp until he finds a stick that he uses to carve out the subway map into the city, explaining each service as he draws out the array. "Every line has about twelve trains running on it at a given time. Each train has ten cars. Hm. Well. You said before that you didn't remember trains?" 

Ingo grimaces, reaching to pull his hat over his brow before finding it gone, tucked away in his pack. "I know conceptually, but I would not say that I remember them, unfortunately. I am starting to understand more about what my role was, largely thanks to your assistance, but I have faced some delays in arriving at true recollection."

Shifting closer, Emmet flips open the dual screen of his Xtransceiver and searches his email until he finds a schematic diagram of the newer trains they run from Gear Station. Ingo squints at the image as Emmet points out different components of a standard car, compares the model to the different stock across the fleet, and tries to convey in words the experience of riding one. "It's the rush. The tons of steel traveling at speeds that feel impossible even after you know how and why it works. But the routine is certain. I can let it carry me along when nothing else has a direction that makes sense. We pride ourselves on running a system that avoids unnecessary delays and prioritizes seamlessly transporting our passengers to their destinations. The trains are a constant. They're always the same, always on a schedule, always on a track. But every day on them is different and new. It's fun. Even without the battles, I'm the happiest on the subway."

Over the course of his description, Ingo stops reviewing the diagram and starts watching him. Emmet doesn't mind, his attention doesn't wear on him like others’ scrutiny. He just wonders if it's doing any good, or if he is leaving Ingo adrift in the idea of a life that he cannot force himself to recall. 

Snapping closed his Xtransceiver, Emmet leans back onto his hands and looks out towards the way they came. Through the high conifer boughs, he can just make out the thin light from the cabin they passed on the way, filtered and scattered through thousands of fractal branches. He yawns, drawing up his hand to dab at tired eyes. 

Ingo says, "Perhaps it's time you retire for the night?" 

"And you’ll wait out here alone? Boo. No can do." In truth, Emmet doesn't want to be left to his head, only just headache-free, with these thoughts unearthed. What would he do but try to shove the idea of Ingo into the gaps and call it memory? Instead, he asks, "Tell me about Hisui? The Pearl Clan? It was home for you, too. I want to know more about it." 

At the end of a low hum, Ingo says, "Certainly. From where should we start?" 

Elesa wakes them both come morning, having fallen asleep with Emmet leaning on Ingo's shoulder and Ingo resting on the crown of Emmet's head. Emmet cracks his eyes open one at a time to fend off daylight and finds Elesa crouching in front of him with her Xtransceiver camera flipped open. He takes three seconds to process, and another two to convince his aching shoulders and knees to move, before he scrambles forward to snap the camera flat against her wrist. 

"Rude, Emmet. I'm documenting our adventure for our lovely pilot. Consider it payment, or something to that effect." 

From camp, Iris calls, "I'm pretty sure we paid for the flight, so I think you owe Dad those photos!" 

Emmet rejects Elesa's proffered hand with a grumble and hauls himself to his feet to stretch out his back, less than pleased at the way his joints crackle in protest. Ingo, recovered from the sudden departure of his headrest, starts apologizing until Emmet interrupts. "I fell asleep on you? And you're at fault how?"

At some point overnight, Sneasel had abandoned the tents and curled up in Ingo's lap. Now, as Ingo hoists her up beneath her arms to climb to his feet, her protestations are distraction enough that Ingo doesn't attempt to explain his remorse. Emmet grins and makes his way over to camp to find breakfast. 

With still days of travel ahead and an appointment with Cynthia to keep, they don't idle long. While the others pack the tents, Emmet and Lucas feed the Pokemon, much to the dismay of the herd of Ponyta that gathered to nibble at the grass at the eastern edge of their clearing. With all but Emmet and Dawn carrying full teams of six, their campsite is alive with morning spars and hungry grousing as Emmet distributes servings as fast as he can. Years of maintaining a team of ten has him prepared, at least, to coordinate the Pokemon into neat lines and to demand patience in sharp glances and light, teasing admonishments. 

Morning light diffuses along the foggy tracks ahead as they set out. The treeline pulls inward as they head north, crowns yearning high overhead as the highland climbs from foothill to mountain side. After a particularly territorial Scyther emerges from the woods with a fury that doesn't quite stand up to Chandelure's overheat, Emmet elects to keep Archeops out and on his shoulders, while Sneasel follows at his side with occasional diversions to Ingo. 

After a little over an hour, the forest trail gives way as the mountain range rears impassable to the north. Around a westward bend, the fog lays heavy across the path forward, but Emmet can just make out the distant roar of waterfalls that spill from the peaks overhead in wide, rushing channels. He encourages Archeops to fly up ahead and, after ten minutes, he returns to Emmet's shoulders, chattering with excitement. 

Another ten minutes pass. Dawn, leading today, shouts in surprise. 

Their route gives way to a sudden cliffside, beneath it a roiling river coursing through a gorge that cuts between the northern mountainside and the foothills that lined their journey from the route’s southern entrance. The path curves up a worn staircase carved into the rock, at the top of which Emmet can just make out a log bridge that leads from one rocky outcropping to the next. 

Emmet's jaw clenches. 

The journey from Oreburgh to Hearthome at the foot of Mount Coronet had conspired to convince him that the climb would be the easier stretch of travel between them and Lake Acuity. His dislike of heights notwithstanding, children had to travel through the mountains to complete their Gym Challenges, right?

Well. 

Dawn takes the first set of stairs two at a time with Barry in pursuit. Over the falls, he can hear them yell back and forth but can't make out what they're saying. As Ingo conducts the others up after them, Sneasel imitating his pointing stance from atop his pack, Emmet wonders if he owes Skyla an apology for years of misjudging flight.

Of course, if Sinnoh had anything more than urban light-rails in their mass transit infrastructure, neither flight nor this nonsense would be necessary. 

Ingo waits for Emmet to start up the stairs, eyeing him. Emmet's jaw twinges with the tension between his teeth. He readies himself with a sharp breath through his nose and starts the climb. 

Following no more than a pace behind him, Ingo says, "It took adjusting, at first, to right myself on the news rails I had found myself on. I take it our station isn't particularly mountainous?"

"Ah, no. It can be. Just not in Nimbasa. Or anywhere near Nimbasa."

Elesa, waiting for them on the landing, says, "Starting to think that was intentional, huh?"

Emmet shrugs, forced composure. "Yup. For the people that built the subway, at least. Improvements on the Brown and Yellow lines are very tedious." Gaining cautious speed before the kids rush out ahead of them, Emmet adds over his shoulder, "Do you think you'll miss this?" 

This may not be the best place to ask questions he doesn't want the answers to. 

Ingo hums, natural volume carrying over the falls, "Perhaps," he says, and Emmet suppresses a flinch. "In many ways, I'm certain I will, particularly after we have reached our stations and the tracks ahead are no longer so… precarious. But I've grown used to yearning for unreachable destinations over the years. I am sure I will adjust." 

Before he had fallen asleep last night, Emmet had analyzed every detail, every microexpression he could make out in the dark and every hitch in Ingo's voice, for a signal that Ingo wanted to return to Hisui. For all the hints at the danger and conflict that had followed him and Dawn during their time there, Emmet could tell his brother misses it, nonetheless. He spoke of his companions, Pokemon allies and clanmates, with nothing short of longing. Here in the mountains, Ingo carries himself with a sense of belonging. 

And if he wanted to return, Emmet wouldn't stop him. No matter what his memories made clear, all he wanted underneath the fear of abandonment that fizzes beneath his skin is for Ingo to be happy. Whether this was at home in Nimbasa or in the home he had found in Hisui, in spite of the odds. Despite the trials. 

Emmet just wanted to be prepared.

After Acuity, maybe he would be brave enough to ask directly. Not yet. 

Stepping out onto the first bridge, there's a kinship between his heart and his stomach as they lurch in tandem. Archeops digs his talons into the nylon of his coat, sensing Emmet's unease and having an answer for one source.

The rapids flood the canyon beneath them and here with nothing but trust and hope, Emmet can recognize that it's beautiful. Water spills over red-gray rocks and around patches of hardy mountain verdure, resolving into an array of trailing streams that dive into mountain caves below, depths obscured by fog and the scattering mists that catch the noon-bright fragments of light that shine through. The sight carries him from bridge to platform, fear no match for wonder. 

Emmet hopes that, if he's not what Ingo chooses, the memories he'll regain at Acuity are enough to distract him, too, from the fear that he won’t make it across to the other side of losing him again. 

Celestic Town stands quiet in the late afternoon calm, like a moment suspended in time, cold as the setting sun dips behind Mount Coronet to the west. Elesa taps at her Xtransceiver, letting Cynthia know they've arrived, while Emmet digs in his pack for meal bars to toss to the kids after Barry complains for the fourth time that afternoon that he's out. 

Emmet remembers being a teenager. Barry is gangly like he was, or maybe they were, meaning his stomach is probably a bottomless pit. They'll have to stock up on what little supplies the Pokemon Center has for sale, given the lack of PokeMart in town. 

As they wait in a huddle at the periphery of town, Emmet is passing a razz berry pie flavored bar to Dawn when she freezes, words catching mid-thanks. Beside them, Ingo sucks in a breath between his teeth. 

A few things happen very quickly. 

Ingo draws up to his full height, and the tendons on his neck visibly thrum as Dawn steps in front of them, throwing her arm out to hold him there. Dawn's right hand closes tight around a pokeball at her waist, and her shoulders shake. 

Past them, a woman Emmet recognizes as Cynthia stops in her approach up the stairway from the hollow at the center of town. 

Dawn presses the catch on the pokeball, and Torterra emerges between Cynthia and them in a flash of red. 

Elesa asks, "Dawn? What's going on?" As she steps forward, Ingo snatches her arm to stay her.  

Torterra waits for a command, eyes anxiously flitting between Dawn and Cynthia. Sneasel weaves her way to Dawn's side and raises her hackles, hissing. 

"Ingo?" Elesa says, but before he has the chance to say anything, Dawn glances back at them over her shoulder, gaze unfocused and skin ashen.

Then, around a broken smile, she laughs, low and airy on the end of a shaky exhale. Her focus recovers, trained on Ingo, and laughing still she says, "Guess he lived, huh?" 

Ingo swallows hard. "It would seem that's a plausible explanation, yes." 

Dawn bites down on her bottom lip, hard, and turns back to face Cynthia, who waits on the stairs with her hands folded in front of her. 

Shushing Sneasel, Dawn steps up to Torterra and lays a hand on his shell. Despite the bulk of her coat, her back visibly heaves with her breathing. "I'm so sorry," she starts, making no sign of recalling Torterra. "You reminded me of someone from my past, and, well, startled me pretty bad. Just--I have to ask for a favor. And I know we’ve asked for a lot already, but," she balls up the hand atop Torterra into a fist, continuing, "would you battle me?" 

Barry and Lucas shout in surprise, Elesa blanches beside him, and Emmet doesn’t forget that the first thing he wanted to do after meeting Ingo was to fight him, to find out what kind of person he was. 

Battling is an excellent judge of character. 

Just who was this person who Cynthia resembled? 

Cynthia approaches cautiously, smile small but not visibly forced. "That's a lot at once. Could I ask why? Usually I don't face many opponents outside of the League, but with you I understand that the situation is… complicated." 

Dawn straightens once Cynthia draws close and their difference in height becomes plain. "Peace of mind." She unclasps her other pokeballs from her belt, and adds, "I've only got three. Shouldn't take long?" 

A moment passes, tension in the air pulled taut. Emmet doesn’t know what Dawn plans to do if Cynthia rejects her request. Would she bolt, again? 

But Cynthia says, "I can't say I'm not curious. A Champion that I can't recall, the Lake Spirits involvement. Your part in Sinnoh's history." Her hands unfolding, she tosses her hair over her shoulder and shrugs a shoulder up to a downturned chin. "If it's what you want, I'll happily oblige. Three on three, you said?" 

Elesa mutters something about how she can't believe this is happening. Ingo's grip on her sleeve slackens, but his posture is still tight, defensive, oblivious to Sneasel vying for his attention at his heels. The kids, excluding Dawn, express degrees of incredulity, from Barry at glee to Lucas at apprehension. Iris recovers first, settling down onto the grass with a look of determined interest. A Champion again. 

This is the first time they’ll witness Dawn battling. Prior to this moment, she had fended off Emmet’s half-joking, half-curious requests and left dealing with wild Pokemon to the others. Despite her history, as well as Ingo’s every indication of her prowess, she had appeared almost indifferent to battle. Until now. 

As Cynthia selects her three, Emmet turns to Ingo and asks, "Who was it? The person like Cynthia." 

Torterra lumbers forward as Dawn and Cynthia round the stretch of worn dirt path that becomes their makeshift arena. Cynthia releases Spiritomb, the air around the trainers warping with sudden pressure under the tones of Spiritomb's shrill, oscillating cry. 

Neither trainer needs a signal to start. 

Torterra leads, rearing back and then landing, heavy, with his front claws on the dirt to launch clusters of stones onto the field which catch, hovering, in mid-air. Stealth rock. Spiritomb's ethereal form gathers and contorts as the swirling aura of dark pulse surges forward and into Torterra from the ground up. 

Ingo says, "I can only share what I know. Dawn and I often followed different tracks during our shared year in Hisui. Hers convened upon on the route of a man named Volo more times than mine. He was a traveling merchant who frequented Jubilife Village." 

Dawn swings her arm out, sending Torterra barging towards Spiritomb before he pivots to his side at the last moment, slamming wood hammer down onto the stone at Spiritomb's core.  On the recoil, Torterra's tree creaks and sheds a leafy branch. With Torterra in her immediate reach, Spiritomb whips up a silver wind cyclone, powdery scales swirling up and around Torterra's exposed head and neck. Torterra groans, reeling back. 

"Ostensibly, Volo wandered Hisui seeking wares and customers as a member of the Ginkgo Guild. Though, I later learned his interests lied more with the myths and legends of the land, and the secrets beneath the region's many ancient ruins. I understand he saw Dawn as a means to an end."

As the scales settle and disappear, Torterra digs its stony nails into the earth and the rattle of earthquake reaches the sidelines where they stand. The fissure collapses in on Spiritomb, and tendrils of purple fog vanish into worn stone as she faints. Red light, then Togekiss lands directly into the stealth rock array. Cynthia winces. 

"On the occasions we met, Volo would press about the nature of my arrival in Hisui. My memory loss was something of a disappointment. Whether Dawn's was similarly detrimental to his ends at first, or if he always intended to leverage her amnesia and position as an outsider from the rifts to achieve his aims, I am uncertain. Regardless, he ingratiated himself to her, and when Jubilife Village turned its back on her, he stood by as one of her few remaining allies. With no station to return to, an ally in the wilderness without the complex allegiances of the clans proved a boon."

Togekiss pulls high into the air with speed unmatched, but Dawn recalls Torterra for Froslass. Air slash slices, wind whistling, into Froslass, but she withstands the hit with a melodic cry that inches higher and higher in pitch until cold, white shards of energy gather in the back of her throat. Ice beam rends across the field towards Togekiss, striking him in the wing. He careens towards Cynthia, but swoops, lopsided, at the last moment to land with his injured wing outstretched, wounded but still standing. 

"As Dawn hurried to locate a solution to the red sky and the rift before Commander Kamado could make a grievous error, one which would have certainly cost lives, Volo lent his support and expertise at every turn. It wasn't until after, in the comparative calm that followed the events on Mount Coronet, that he apparently unveiled his true colors."

Each at respective ends of the disheveled battlefield, Froslass and Togekiss gather elemental energy, ice and fire, both ready to take the other down. Dawn pitches forward, closer to eye level with Froslass, and shouts ' now ' at the top of her lungs as Froslass unleashes another ice beam. The red-hot flames that collected in the air around Togekiss dissipate into smoke as the beam hits him square in the breast. Lucario follows, landing amid the rock trap without a flinch. 

"One day, a month after peace settled in Jubilife, Dawn disappeared from town for weeks. She left without a word, beyond an earlier warning that she would in the wilds for some time on behalf of Professor Laventon's Pokedex effort."

Dawn rises and rolls her shoulders back as dark energy starts to gather beneath Froslass. Destiny bond coils in purple and black towards Lucario, a sure end to the battle with Froslass's speed. But, bullet punch always goes first. Lucario leaps at Froslass with disorienting speed, landing a one-two fist and sending Froslass limp to Dawn's feet. Rapidash emerges in a flash of red, rearing onto his hind legs. 

"When she returned, wounded and in shambles, she didn't speak to anyone for near a week, after she gave her report. It was a local boy, about her age, that coaxed her out of her shell. We, meaning the handful of us in Jubilife lucky enough to have her trust, learned that Volo sought an audience with Arceus. His aims, a vision of a new world, entailed the destruction of Hisui, and he had convinced Giratina to tear the rift above Mount Coronet that was responsible for the turmoil of the months prior. He fought together with Giratina again to steal the artifacts Dawn received as gifts from the Nobles, and made clear that he would kill her if that was what it would take."

Lucario rushes in for close combat, but hesitates at the force of the heat emanating from Rapidash's mane as flame bursts forth to cloak his body. In a burst of speed, Rapidash charges with flare blitz, trampling Lucario in a flash of roaring fire. Lucario falls in one hit. 

"Volo was not strong enough to defeat her." 

Cynthia recalls Lucario and claps her hands in front of her face, smiling wide. 

"He vanished into the mountain. We sent instructions to detain him if he set foot in Jubilife or either clan settlement, but it seems the inhabited regions of Hisui were not his destination. In the months that followed, we presumed him dead or, at the least, beyond Hisui’s reaches."

Cynthia approaches Dawn now, congratulatory and amiable. Dawn's defenses drop, just slightly, and she takes Cynthia's outstretched hand to shake. 

Emmet and Elesa share a look and Ingo releases the tension in his shoulders and scrubs at his face. "It is my understanding that the rift led to Palkia and Dialga's unrest, meaning that Volo, and Giratina by extension, caused all that followed. It would not be inaccurate, then, to suggest that Volo caused Arceus to require aid from the future. I only wonder, had I been successful in my attempt to convince the Galaxy Team to rescind their decision to exile Dawn during the red sky, had I held my temper then, could there have been a route where Dawn did not have to face him by herself. Or had Arceus always intended, perhaps expected, that such tracks were hers alone to navigate?"

Emmet looks from Ingo, drawn and defeated, to Dawn as she and Cynthia round towards the group. Speaking low, Dawn’s hand gestures an apology with a tight bow at the shoulders. Emmet wonders if Cynthia can tell how Dawn maintains her guard in the set of her brow and the way she positions herself between the group and Cynthia as they come to a stop. 

Dawn carries herself like she battles, he now knows, fierce and uncompromising underneath a guise of self-assured confidence. It's not lost on Emmet that she defeated the Champion, albeit on reduced teams, with only one Pokemon down. And even that loss had been intended, a deliberate sacrifice with destiny bond cut short but, ultimately, unneeded. 

Ingo battles with every strategy calculated in advance, all timing and precision. Dawn battles to survive. 

Dawn shifts her attention to them and inclines her head. "I'm really sorry, guys. That probably seemed extremely uncalled for. Technically, it kind of was? I just had to see."

"I think I understand," says Elesa, stepping forward to greet Cynthia with a hug. They collectively ignore Dawn's suppressed flinch. When Elesa pulls away, she adds, "Just, give us a warning next time. If you can." 

"I'm hoping there won't be a next time."

They agree to divert to the Pokemon Center, allowing Cynthia and Dawn a chance to heal their Pokemon while also avoiding the handful of curious stares that peer out from nearby houses on account of the commotion.

There, as Dawn waits at the counter, Cynthia eyes Ingo and says, "You must be Ingo. That's an interesting symbol on your sweater, you know. And you have a Sneasel variant I've never seen before. Is she, perhaps, related to the Sneasel evolution from the Highlands legends? But, then, that symbol is associated with the tundra. Well traveled, are you?"

Ingo blinks, faltering at the thorough read of his person, and Cynthia laughs lightly and shakes her head. "Sorry! I promised Elesa that I'd wait until we met to ask questions, and battling Dawn just left me with so many more than I had prepared. Let me try again." She extends a hand across the table, which Sneasel sniffs at while Ingo gathers himself. When Ingo pulls himself together and shakes her hand, she says, "I'm Cynthia. Technically, it turns out we've met, but conditions as they are, I don't think either of us should be held to account for forgetting."

It's Emmet's turn to startle. But it made sense, didn't it? He had met Cynthia years ago, long enough now that it would have been before Ingo went to Hisui. But, then, Cynthia should have forgotten, too.

"Isn't it strange?" Cynthia continues, voice gentle with practiced care. "Someone from across the world getting caught up in the machinations of Sinnoh's Legendaries. With the same girl that you met on the whim of a PR trip. Honestly, the odds feel impossible, but, of course, the entities we're talking about don't deal in odds, do they?"

As Dawn approaches the table, Ingo clears his throat and, even then, his voice strains as he says, "I'm afraid I cannot-- I'm sorry, forgive my haste, but you're saying that you have evidence that Dawn and I met before Hisui?" 

Dawn freezes, and their collective attention swings to Cynthia, who does not balk. "I do! Last night, I stumbled upon records of a trip some four, maybe five years ago. To celebrate the new Champion, our Dawn here. Unova had recently named a new young Champion as well, and my dear friends Elesa and Skyla suggested a televised tournament. A show of Sinnoh's and Unova's strength and talent. It turned out that Unova's Champion had two eager cousins who ran the region’s latest battle facility and, well, the rest is history."

For the first time since Lake Valor, since becoming Dawn again, Dawn beams, wide and genuine. Slamming her hands flat onto the table between Elesa and Cynthia, she leans towards Ingo and cries, "I was right! I was right. We had met and battled before Hisui. Ingo, I've known you all along." 

Ingo smiles softly, and says, "So it seems. It appears our tracks were more closely aligned than I had thought." 

Emmet bites his tongue, not wanting to disrupt what was clearly a relief for them both. But again he feels heat rise in his chest like fury threatening to erupt, and again he reels at the stench of predestination, at the absence of choice. 

Four, maybe five, years ago, was it? How many weeks, days even, passed between that moment and the loss? How long did Arceus give them? 

Had they ever stood a chance?  

Chapter Text

"So, you're saying that the Noble Pokemon were descendants of a single team, the retinue of the ancient hero of legend? All ten of them? And while these Pokemon could be traced back to their ancestors, the identity of the hero was lost to time?" 

Cynthia leans closer to Ingo with a scrape of metal legs on vinyl tiling, lifting her chin perched on one hand to draw out her arm and clasp both hands laid long on the tabletop. As he pulls his back straight, jostling Sneasel sleeping in his lap and reclaiming some breathing room from her curiosity, she continues. "Here I was thinking that their nobility was correlated with their association with Sinnoh. All of them were Sinnoan variants or evolutions associated with the region, you know? I should have guessed, though, that Sinnoh's long history of isolation would have meant that revered Pokemon wouldn't have been chosen based on a comparison to other regions. Silly me, honestly."

In the seat next to Ingo, Lucas’s pen glides across notebook pages at a frenetic pace, breaking only to stare sporadically up at Cynthia with starstruck wonder. Iris, too, focuses intently, tapping away at her Xtransceiver when Cynthia draws an apt connection between her research and Ingo's experience, apparently keeping her father cognizant of any new theories. 

In stark comparison, Dawn clenches her fists at her sides beneath the table’s edge any time Cynthia asks about Arceus. So, Ingo steers the conversation towards his years in Hisui, glad to divert away from the dealings of Legendary Pokemon to the beliefs held by the Pearl Clan and his role as Warden. Even if the attention unsettles him. 

The resemblance is uncanny. Cynthia mirrors Volo in ways beyond their keen eyes and careful expressions. Her questions diverge from Volo’s relentless tracks, but advance on the same station: Arceus. Only, her desire for knowledge is ostensibly benign. Not only does Elesa vouch for her, but all evidence suggests that Dawn and Cynthia had been friends once. 

Ingo has to swallow his protective instincts, regardless of how every avid glance Cynthia directs towards Dawn makes his heart race. He cannot imagine how Dawn feels as she makes yet another leap of faith and chooses to trust again, however warily. 

And only after a battle. 

It was telling, watching Dawn in action outside of the context of spars at the Training Grounds. Not that she fought with any less of her mettle during those matches, except perhaps with Rei, but, against Cynthia, she had forgone any pretext of friendly competition. Without her usual cheerful commentary, her prowess took on a character unfamiliar to him. There was no delay between her command and an attack, her Pokemon charging at the extension of her arm like a swordsman's slash of a blade. 

Whether her lethality results from Hisui or preceded it, Ingo is uncertain. It does not elude him that she had encountered Sinnoh's deities before being chosen by Arceus. Professor Rowan's review of her Pokedex records provided evidence of not insignificant interaction with several Legendary Pokemon, but Cynthia plainly confirms it. 

More than a Champion, in certain circles Cynthia is famous for derailing the apocalyptic plots of a man named Cyrus and for traversing the realm known as the Distortion World, Giratina's domain. There weren't records of Dawn’s involvement, as there had been regarding her League title, but Cynthia was a diligent chronicler. 

Entry after entry all with the same phrase: ' With Dawn.' 

Cynthia is an accomplished woman. But there's a year of assumptions made with Dawn’s memory erased, and Cynthia's proximity to certain events became understood as responsibility for their outcomes. Ingo has to hold his tongue against the impulse to ask why Dawn had been involved, then only twelve, if Cynthia was so competent and deeply entangled in the disaster that Dawn’s impact was so easily overlooked.  

He tries to ignore the memory of Volo, always two steps behind Dawn as she unraveled the mysteries of the rifts. After all, was Professor Rowan the same man as Kamado? And for all their subtle similarities, Lucas was not Rei. Ingo’s suspicion was unfounded and unnecessary. Dawn had made her decision. 

Cynthia is their ally. 

So Ingo says, with every amiable ounce he can muster, "While wary of outsiders, certainly, the Clans were themselves passengers to Hisui once. The hero, as I understood, was of the original Celestica people, though the Pearl and Diamond Clans both referred to themselves as the Celestica people by my time. They envisioned themselves as carrying on that legacy in the name of the Almighty Sinnoh. Perhaps the association between the Hisuian nativity and the varieties of Pokemon that made up the Nobles is less improbable than you think. Each of the Nobles has strong bonds to the land."

Speaking for the first time since settling at the table, Emmet grumbles, "You sound like Uncle Drayden."

Iris leans around Ingo with a smirk. "Looks like you're outnumbered now, Emmet. Two against one in favor of Dad’s stories.” 

As Emmet sticks out his tongue at her, Cynthia hums and says, "It is interesting that both Unova and Sinnoh have mythologies that center on pivotal hero figures and their partners. If I remember correctly, Unova's are about the heroes uniting with Legendary Pokemon, while Sinnoh's seem to suggest the hero did battle against the Legendaries. And, then, Dawn did a bit of both. You faced Dialga and Palkia, but they also became your allies."

"Right. Even Giratina, in the end. But that was also the case before Hisui. I caught Giratina here, too."

"You did," Cynthia agrees, leaning back in her seat and looking up at the wall behind them. "Twice, now, you've single-handedly advanced the region's understanding of a Pokemon otherwise perceived as a violent, unknowable evil. And both times you released it, allowing it to return to its domain." 

Dawn laughs, bright and airy, but her fingers fold tight around the seat of her chair. "What was I meant to do? Keep it at the lab? Feed it oran berries?" Her smile drops, gaze pulling distant, and she adds, "Besides, I don't think I caught it for myself. Or even for Professor Rowan to study. I caught it so somebody else wouldn't, right?" 

Emmet speaks up again, serious this time. "Did it want to be caught?" 

Turning to look at him, Ingo studies the tension at his jawline and around his narrowed eyes, masked by a neutral smile. His tendency to analyze other's expressions in Hisui coheres, now, in light of Emmet’s constant, subtle control over his expression and demeanor. A lifetime of study missing the subject. He had sought out his brother in the habits of strangers when Emmet was a stranger to him still. 

"I don't know," Dawn says, glancing at Cynthia for her input. "I don't remember." 

Cynthia sighs. "I have no memory of the battle with Giratina in the Distortion World. I remember being there, I remember why I was there, but I didn't even realize there had been a battle until rereading my notes the other day. Sorry!" 

Emmet waves his hand, denying any need for an apology and brushing the question aside. He catches Ingo's stare and gives him a small shrug before his attention slides to the lobby floor, smile growing suddenly more genuine as he catches sight of Elesa and Barry returning from the lower level with trays of food in tow. 

It's a welcome distraction, given the conversation's trajectory back towards Dawn's exploits. 

Barry distributes the meals, a collection of bottled teas and donburis from the hot food counter. To Dawn and Lucas he tosses two plastic-wrapped dumplings, which Dawn gasps at as she unwraps. The odd looks that turn her way go unheeded as she snatches the nearest utensil kit, Emmet's, and saws the dumpling in half, handing the upper portion to Ingo. With a smile that reaches her eyes this time, she says, "Let's see if I got it right." 

Ah. Ingo takes it, remembering the rice balls on Prelude Beach an age ago. A life ago.

"I remembered these. Back in Hisui. When I was fairly sure that Ingo was from where I was, and that I had met him before, I made these for him to see if he remembered them, too. He didn't. I was still right, though."

It was similar. Too salty, and the seaweed wrap was new. Dawn's face, wrinkled up nose and furrowed brow turning to thoughtful consideration, suggests a similar experience. "Not quite it, right? Mine were plainer, so you could taste the rice. I think Mom's were like that, too."

"Why would you want to taste more of the rice? That's not the point," Barry says, already finished with his and turning to his donburi.

Lucas says, "That’s just you. What you like is actually not universal?" An argument follows. 

Emmet, meanwhile, has popped the lid off the rim of Ingo's bowl and attempts to surreptitiously shove bits of cabbage from his meal to Ingo's. When caught, he flashes his teeth and says, "I'm sharing. No more foraged scraps for you. Eat up!" 

There's an argument to be made about the relative nourishment found in their diet of convenience food over the last days compared to what he ate in Hisui. Ingo holds his tongue. Less this time, he realizes, out of some fear that he will overstep his undefined role and position himself as a reproachful presence Emmet did not want. No. The thought that bubbles up is simple and sure. They’ve had this debate before, and will have it again. 

For now, fondness inescapable, Ingo rolls his eyes and lifts away the lid entirely to transfer a portion of his rice into Emmet's bowl. "A fair trade, then." 

Emmet and Elesa were not built for Coronet or the Icelands. The kids, perhaps, had the advantage of youth. Barry and Lucas had familiarity with the terrain. But Ingo could recall his first weeks and months, perpetually sore and hungry from the sheer distances he covered and heights he scaled. Hence his pack now was weighed down with provisions and medical supplies from Veilstone, the cost for which he would have to find some way to recoup Elesa for once home again. 

He hadn't been able to protect them from Valor. Azelf prevented him from protecting them, cast out of the cave on puppet's strings and blockaded beyond its threshold by stone and psychic might. And now their route would send them into the cold again, with Uxie and its lake an unknown threat. 

The least he could do was to be prepared. If that meant forgoing some dense, carbohydrate calories when the opportunity arose, so be it. 

As Iris weighs in on the convenience food debate, highlighting the pros and cons of Unovan corner shop cuisine, Ingo banishes the thoughts of the tracks ahead and focuses on his meal. 

Until Cynthia says, "Dawn. About your mother…" 

Ingo’s breath catches but, with a fair amount of restraint, he does not freeze as Dawn does beside him, so he doesn't draw further attention. The others talk on, only Emmet and Elesa catching Cynthia's soft, careful voice. 

Ingo readies himself to intervene, this a question too far, but Cynthia only says, "Would it help if I escorted her to Snowpoint to meet you there after you finish at Lake Acuity? If you're hiking there, I can take a couple of days to prepare for the League and should still have time to arrange things for you outside of the administrative nonsense. The important things."

Dawn bites down on her lower lip and then looks to Ingo. He thinks, at first, she's expecting him to weigh in. He would insist, likely unhelpfully, on whatever course makes her feel most secure. But then she says, "It would keep you from having to follow me all the way back to Twinleaf." Before Ingo can protest, she turns to Cynthia and adds, "Does my mom know you?"

"Personally? I don't know. I suspect any acquaintance we may have had is lost alongside our memories of you. That won't matter, though, after facing Uxie. Before that, I'll figure something out." 

Barry, who Ingo had been certain was not listening, shifts in his chair towards Dawn, suddenly serious. "She already knows something's up, Dawn. Mom and her talk, and for every photo of you with me in my house, there's one of me with you in yours. She’s probably freaking out just like my parents are." Dawn flinches, and Barry gives her an apologetic half-smile before directing his next point to Cynthia. "Dad--um, Palmer--is on the mainland for once. He can help. I kinda, uh, ruined our plans by rushing off to meet these guys, so he's hurting for something to do about all this, even without an idea of what this is." 

Cynthia sags a little on the mention of Barry's father, carefully maintained countenance slipping to something weary. "That's a fantastic idea," her voice says while her expression does not. "I'll prioritize contacting the Gym Leaders and the Elite Four, and preparing the League PR branch. Keeping things vague for now. We'll get a story sorted, get together a unified front, and then all you'll have to worry about is getting from Acuity to Snowpoint, and then home."

That an end is so close settles off-kilter in Ingo's chest. Within days, the world would remember them both. On the other side of remembering were the roles that they played, the notions of who they were not just to family and friends, but to entire regions. 

The tracks before them carried them towards reclaiming their roles as they had left them. Hisui would be no more than a minor divergence around a fault on the rails, and they could fall back onto their original routes and return to their previous stations. That is, provided they remember themselves along the way. 

With or without their memories, Ingo and Dawn had both changed. And their worlds had changed without them, unaware of their absence and therefore unable to accommodate the hollow they left behind as life pressed ever forward. 

The question Ingo has, still, is whether they would know their parts. Would they remember? If so, would they fulfill those roles again, or reject them entirely? Was there a version in between? 

It's snowing the next morning as they set off from their campsite on Route 211 towards the tunnels. Mount Coronet's breadth is easier to navigate through than over in the absence of Lady Sneasler or another Pokemon both able and willing to carry them up the sheer mountainside. Without a map of the cave systems as they now were, in Sinnoh's modern day, Ingo leads on memory and instinct. The major caverns shouldn’t be much changed in a couple of centuries, and he knows which to avoid in the event the tunnels fell in disrepair in this age of machinery that cuts more direct routes through the Highlands. Lucas and Iris follow close behind him, but the group is silent as they enter the passageway into the mountain. Only Sneasel, weaving between fields of pampas grass and the lone cedar trees in elated recognition of her mother’s territory, is unperturbed by the scale of the mountain range that looms before them. 

Darkness follows Ingo’s first steps into the cavern, the morning’s low light under snowfall barely leaking past the threshold. He lays a palm flat on the rough interior wall and releases Chandelure, bathing the hollow in her ghostly light. She chirps, a little spin sending motes of ember into the stagnant air, and Ingo says, "If only I had you by my side, my duties would have been less difficult to maintain on schedule."

Her fire glows brighter, warm yellow-white seeping into the usual cool hues. An agreement. The light of her assent widens the limits of their dark perimeter, revealing a route north and south. Their trajectory to the Icelands justifies heading northward, but intuition directs him south. The path from the Celestica Ruins towards the Pearl Clan Settlement wound in circles within the leeward side of Coronet, by virtue of the rivers of snowmelt carving sinuous paths of least resistance over the millennia of erosion. 

With a point and call, he directs them southward, careful to keep his voice low enough as to avoid disrupting the scattered Zubat colonies roosting in the high ceilings. An early lesson learned via an encounter with an Alpha Steelix that had not taken kindly to his volume. Machop and Gligar were too inexperienced, then, to face such a foe, and Ingo too unaccustomed to Hisui to recognize a dire threat. Lady Sneasler had to save him for the second time, well before he had become her Warden. 

Dawn says as they press on, "You ever think about how you were right to be afraid of that Alpha Crobat?"

Ingo hums. "I recall defeating him more than once. But I will admit, your training outpaced mine in due time. You are a natural-born trainer, after all."

Gently punching his unbruised arm, she sidesteps the compliment. "I think I had a Crobat on my team here, too. I wasn't sure, since I could only really remember Torterra, Rapidash and Froslass. It's not that I would love to travel with any of the Pokemon I caught in the past, it's just…" 

She trails off, and Ingo lets the quiet settle for a moment while watching Chandelure drift beside him. Where she belongs. She chirps light admonishments at Sneasel, curtailing her attempts to bolt ahead into the familiar dark. "You longed for your chosen partners. I can certainly understand that."

The wide cave narrows into a tight passage, forcing them to proceed one at a time. After asking Excadrill to confirm the way doesn't taper down to a point they could not pass, Ingo sends Chandelure up and to the center of their procession, angled light casting his shadow out long in front of him. His silhouette without his coat is unfamiliar. He had never parted with it, after that first week of bedrest in the Pearl Settlement, convinced that it had been the difference between life and death in those first days and then unable to let go of what fragile, tenuous link he had to his lost history. 

He missed it now, in the depths of his pack, but not near as much as he had in those abrupt bursts of consciousness on the floor of Calaba's medical tent. Wild with fear, strange people with their unfamiliar accents offering no hint of where he had departed from and could not remember. He had begged for it to be returned to him, alongside his cap, with fierce, loud hysterics. Calaba had draped it over him to ensure he didn’t over-exert himself, but it took months to gain her real trust thereafter. 

The narrow passage gives way, after a time, to a spacious tunnel encompassed by sheer slopes of damp, dripping rock. The temperature drops, his breath coming out in wisps as he pulls to the side to wait for his passengers to emerge one at a time into the clearing. Light spills in from an opening to the north and up, though the most direct route is buried beneath a mass of collapsed stone. A cave in, not recent. The rubble shifts and stirs to indicate the presence of Graveller, better left undisturbed. 

The impossibly high ceiling inhibits Chandelure's light from piercing the layer of dark above them, only the ends of yearning, precipitous stalactites initially visible. As Ingo's eyes adjust, the shadows resolve into jittering shapes and white sclera reflecting off purple-blue flame. He raises a finger to his lips to signal that the others remain quiet. The Golbat colony watches from overhead as they ebb to the wall of the tunnel, angling towards an uneven outcropping they’ll need to scale to reach the upper landing. 

Dawn hoists herself up, leaping from rocky handhold to handhold, and clambers onto the next level, holding out an arm for Barry and Iris to follow. Lucas, less athletic, balks. Unspoken is the agreement that using their Pokemon would increase the risk of the Golbat and Graveller attacking. Though unlikely that the wild Pokemon would pose a genuine threat, given that Dawn's Froslass alone would make quick work of anything residing here, they had a schedule to keep. Moreso with Cynthia’s involvement. What delays they could avoid were essential to arriving at Lake Acuity on time. 

So lifting Lucas, much to his flustered, red-faced dismay, proves faster than risking a battle. While Ingo is fairly certain he could lift Emmet and Elesa, too, there’s nothing to be gained in exacerbating the strain that gathers tight between his shoulder blades. Rather, he drops his pack and leans his back flat against the smoother stretch of wall next to the outcropping. Bracing himself on bent legs, he boosts Emmet then Elesa up with cupped hands. Ingo then ascends up the wall in much the same manner as Dawn, earning him baffled gapes from Emmet and Elesa as he pulls himself onto the landing. Sneasel follows, purring as she shoves her head against Ingo’s leg, ecstatic at the opportunity to climb without Chandelure’s scolding. 

Voice barely above a whisper, Emmet says, "What the fuck?" 

Ingo manages not to chuckle. "I spent years in the mountains, Emmet. I did not require Lady Sneasler to carry me everywhere." 

A flutter of wings rushes through the air above like a gust of wind through a forest canopy. Ingo winces. They pause for a moment, staring up at hundreds of eyes peering back down at them, but the Golbat hold. 

On soft, slow steps and muted breaths, they round the perimeter of the upper platform. Between footfalls, Ingo recalls guiding members of both Clans, as well as the occasional Ginkgo Guildsperson, through the torch-lit tunnels underneath this same mountain. Chandelure's glow, casting a small circle at pace with the group’s process, is a constant where the torches were not. Without a fire Pokemon to light them, keeping the tunnels safe was a constant effort. 

Life then was a routine, which Ingo kept to like clockwork. The regularity eased his scattered mind and transformed those harrowing months in amnesia’s fugue into the certainty that a schedule provides. He would wake up in his Highland tent, then feed his Pokemon and run spars while checking in on his Lady and, occasionally, her kits. He would run daybreak safety checks on the passageways, lighting the torches and monitoring structural instabilities and local Pokemon activity. He would nap, forage, or train until passengers arrived needing conducting. Evenings with the Lady Sneasler and his Pokemon in her den would follow, cooking over sputtering fires and conversing aimlessly at an audience that would not judge him or find him strange. 

There was no need, now, for a Highlands Warden to guide leery travelers. With his sincerest hope and ambition seen through, a world where Pokemon were not feared but loved, the mountain could be navigated without a guide, man or Pokemon. 

Ingo wonders, chest tight, how long after they left had the change occurred. Seek out all Pokemon, Arceus had commanded, beckoning a Hisui that recognized them as partners and allies, vice enemies. The reality of the Almighty Sinnoh's true identities displaced long-held and long-debated belief systems, and with it the feud between the clans. Jubilife flourished, becoming the city that Ingo could only recognize from above, new infrastructure along old, albeit fresh-paved paths. 

Somewhere during that change, Hisui became Sinnoh, the Clans became one nation, and the nobles and the Almighty Sinnoh receded to myth and legend. 

There were no torches in these caves. There were no Wardens in the Highlands. There were no Sneasels or Sneaslers on this mountain. 

Ingo inhales deeply, closing his eyes. The ache of it gathers at the core of him, a fresh wound still, coursing through his veins. He counts to three on the cadence of his heartbeat. He exhales, unwinding the pain and longing to expel it with all the air in his lungs. 

One foot. Then another. There was only forward. Onto to the next destination. 

Around the last corner, the crisp scent of fresh snow carries on the air from the wind through a high crevice illuminated by hazy white light. Between them and the surface is another sheer slope, taller than the first, craggy footholds damp with snowmelt condensation. Centuries were short, in geological terms, but enough that what had once been a manageable climb had frozen and fractured into a problem. 

Elesa, at his shoulder now, whispers, "I don't think we're climbing this one, Ingo. Should we risk it?" 

A moment passes, spent in consideration, then Ingo nods. A whispered discussion conveys the plan, and a point without a call directs them onward. 

Chandelure returns to her pokeball. Elesa and Emmet release their respective Galvantula. Lucas releases Tangrowth, and Iris Salamence. A thousand eyes blink white-black-white above, and high-pitched chittering swells and floods the cavern. Stones rumble from the rubble below. Barry is already up on the landing, courtesy of Staraptor, when the colony surges down and towards them. 

Dawn and Ingo climb onto Salamence's back as Tangrowth hauls Iris and Lucas to the upper platform. Flashes of searing light rend the cavern darkness in streaks of lightning, stray, singed Golbat careening to the ground. The Galvantula can only hit one at a time, though, and the flock flies as one, writhing mass, screeching as it pours towards the opening by way of where Emmet and Elesa stand. 

On Ingo's instruction, Salamence veers to dump him and Dawn bodily onto the landing. Dawn catches herself in a roll, quickly onto her hands and feet, whereas Ingo catches his bruised shoulder and stumbles through starbursts of pain behind pinched-closed eyelids to his knees. Salamence circles back to the lower platform as the second--no, third--round of thunder bathes the cave in blinding lightning that rapidly fizzles into darkness as the fastest among the Golbat dive through the passageway to cut off the weak daylight. Enough Golbat are deterred by lightning that the crowd thins, preventing their landing from being overrun. Dawn tows Ingo to his feet by his uninjured arm, pulling him towards the pinpricks of light that break through flailing wings.

Shielding himself and Dawn with outstretched arms, Ingo counts down from three. On the beat between two and one, Salamence soars past with Elesa and Emmet, carving a line through the Golbat toward the exit. Dawn drags him by the arm to follow out to the surface, diving to the right and into a snowbank. Pivoting on his hip, Ingo watches the dark mass of Golbat undulate as they rise towards the shrouded mountaintop, a cacophony of wings and shrill, echoing cries. 

Emmet laughs, wild and gleeful, until Elesa elbows him despite her own grin. Both unharmed. 

Ingo scans the group. Sneasel bounds up to him, the first to mount the slope, and leaps into his arms. Barry helps Iris to her feet in the opposite snowbank as Lucas leans against Tangrowth to catch his breath. Dawn rushes to them. No injuries. All passengers accounted for. 

They've arrived at a clearing nestled between a ridge and the dizzying climb to Coronet's summit, which pierces the shroud of gray clouds that lay just below its peak, a white and gray basin obscuring the remnants of the Temple of Sinnoh within. 

Was Arceus there, waiting? Or would Arceus only appear if it knew they intended to meet it, anticipating them with omniscient insight? Had it known when it offered the option to change course whether they would take it? Whether they would stay? 

Ingo allows the thought to fade like the melting flakes of snow that catch onto the fabric of his tunic and dissipate there on his chest. He could wonder about it endlessly, puzzling out Arceus’s motivations and intentions until he came upon a conclusion that assumes to make sense of the inscrutable. There would be time for that later. 

Arceus's domain is not their destination. Beyond the clearing is a trail that weaves between ridges and crevices towards the route down to the northern valley, and it is Ingo’s role to lead. Gathering his courage, he pulls to his feet and again they set forth. 

About an hour from the cave, they stop to eat under a cliffside overhang beneath the north face of the summit. If not for the low layer of cloud cover smothering the distant landscape, Ingo imagines he could see the entire Icelands stretching in endless white towards the horizon. 

Ingo spends the duration of their stop in thoughtful silence, caught again in the intersecting tracks of his past life and his current journey. His quiet earns him some strange glances from Dawn and Emmet in particular, but on their third day of hiking from Lake Valor, conversation is sparse enough already that Ingo's solemnity goes unquestioned. 

When they set out again, it's early afternoon. The snow stops, briefly, as shards of sunlight crest the gloom, but it offers little warmth against the gales of wind that howl along the slopes. Better to find their way back into the mountain to make their descent. There would be no avoiding the cold beyond the mountain, but the lower altitude would dull the wind chill. At least, until the climb to Lake Acuity. 

It will be fine. Ingo assures himself of that ad nauseum as he guides the others down a meandering slope towards the interior route he hopes to still find intact. 

The route north was not the same as the frozen tracts that Arceus abandoned him to. The years had softened it, carving tracks to and from the city that the Pearl Settlement became. Dawn and Barry had both traversed it as children on their way to an arena--a Gym, like Elesa’s--meant to host travelers from across the region. 

These were tracks meant to be followed, however arduously, and not the wasteland he had fled at the first opportunity. 

Ingo had been relieved, when Lady Sneasler chose him and justified changing stations to the Highlands. Eight months in the Settlement and the cold had soaked deep into his bones, withering him. He had only survived those first days in the wilderness because Arceus was kind enough to deliver him there in summer, a fact that eluded him until preparations for the blizzard season required his aid. A mouth to feed, a body to work.

That autumn ingratiated him to all but the most staunch skeptics. There was no shortage of labor, and Ingo had yearned for any distraction from the grief that haunted him beneath the haze of amnesia.

So when winter demanded weeks and months kept inside the tents, hunkered down with last season’s preserves stewed over scant fires, Ingo grew restless. When the snowfall first cleared and people remarked on unseasonably clear skies, he made it an excuse to wander. The reprieve did not hold.  

Those first days in Hisui he hardly remembered. That winter he would not forget. 

The cavern entrance stands exactly where Ingo expects it, a deep set hollow in the rock where snowmelt had long since stopped flowing, diverting instead for easier pathways. First, he releases Excadrill and Crustle to confirm structural stability and clear, if needed, any obstructions at the bottom. They lack Gliscor's wings, ideal for vertical tunnels, but they seem unperturbed by the task. As they work, Ingo fixes a rope to a nearby boulder, requesting Haxorus fulfills Machamp's role ensuring it’s secure. 

Emmet blanches at him, wind-chapped flush receding to a pallor. "You're kidding me," he bites out, a glance passing from Ingo to the entrance and to Ingo again. 

He had forgotten Emmet’s fear of heights. 

"I assure you, it's entirely safe. I have traveled this route countless times, and know it's the surest way down."

Emmet's jaw tightens, the round muscle bulging in his cheek. He steps closer, peering down the tunnel before reeling ck on his heels. A moment passes as he catches his breath, then he turns back to Ingo with wide, pleading eyes, to say, "You're sure?" 

"I am certain." 

Emmet nods tightly before returning to the rest of the group to wrap his arm around Elesa's, waiting for Ingo's cue. 

Countless passengers, their clan, guild or team association notwithstanding, had trusted Ingo to conduct them through Mount Coronet to the Icelands. When Lady Sneasler was indisposed, they had placed their faith in him entirely, and he saw them safely through the mountain's treacherous heights every time. 

That faith pales compared to the trust of his brother now, visibly terrified but following him onwards. It makes his lungs seize, his chest ache. The lengths Emmet is willing to go to remember him proved boundless at every new challenge. 

Ingo grits his teeth, returning to the task at hand. Chandelure proceeds ahead, her intangibility a means to confirm that the tunnel leads to an eventual outlet. Ingo watches her sink, committing to memory the juts and clefts along the wall they would use to descend.

He would not fail them.

He would restore their memories. He would reunite Dawn with her mother. He would ensure that she, Lucas and Barry return to their homes, their family whole again. He would travel with his family to Nimbasa City. 

He would find himself again. 

Chandelure returns, followed by Crustle and Excadrill, with chitters and trills conveying that the way is clear. Ingo directs Chandelure to the far wall of the hollow for light with a soft press on her glass and whispers of thanks, then pivots towards the group as they wait. Interrupting the kids' low conversion, Ingo says, "Barry, you’re accompanied by a Snorlax on your team, correct?" 

Barry nods, eyebrows jumping beneath blond bangs.  

Though loath to send a child down first, there's an advantage to having an extra safety measure. “I believe your Snorlax could serve as a precautionary cushion. Seven of us to lower will put some strain on the rope. Might I conduct your descent first?”

Barry's face lights up, presumably at the notion of a Snorlax landing, so Ingo insists, "Snorlax or no, we will still proceed with safety, not fun, as priority."

Undeterred, Barry squeezes Dawn's shoulder and jogs up to meet Ingo by the opening. Ingo guides him through each step of tying a harness with rope, looping two ends over outstretched arms and then up around his shoulders, pulled tight to cross over his chest. After Haxorus checks the knots are secure, Ingo follows with a waist harness, up around Barry's back and through his legs, and he attaches the feed rope where the two harnesses join. 

Once Barry is secure, Dawn calls over, "I can see why you didn't let me climb without Lady Sneasler. I'd have given up at the first loop and climbed by hand." 

"You would have attempted once," Ingo responds, tone flat, "and either she or I would have found you and forbidden you from returning to the mountain. There is no excuse that justifies forgoing your safety checks."

"Melli would have let me."

"Warden Melli would have had a thoroughly enjoyable time explaining to the Galaxy Team that his negligence as a Warden of the Highlands led to their prodigy being put in harm’s way. Or to Adaman, for that matter." He looks over his shoulder at her, softening. "Besides, my Lady would never have refused your call. A trait we have in common." 

Another tug on Barry's harness, then on the anchor, and he guides Barry over the edge to the first foothold. Steadily feeding rope with his brake hand firm where the loose lengths slacken and gather, Ingo watches over his shoulder and Chandelure trills with encouragement when Barry's foot finds each hold as she lights the way down. 

Slow, steady progress rewards them as Barry lands on the cavern floor with a jerk of the rope and a whoop. A groan echoes up the tunnel, Snorlax emerging at the bottom as planned. Once Barry has untied himself, Ingo hauls up the rope and glances at his five remaining passengers. 

"Elesa?" 

Best to get an adult down there before Barry rushes ahead. Emmet's grip tightens around her arm before she steps forward, eyeing Ingo with an unspoken demand to keep her safe. 

As he sets her harnesses, she grumbles, "I have no memory to back this up, but my gut says you being a mountaineer is insane. This feels insane. The battling, the weird Pokemon nobility thing, the clans, all of it was fine. The time-traveling, even. But, this? Unreal."

When he secures the knots, he manages to look at her despite the abashed flush that rises to his cheeks, and he finds her smiling softly. "I'm really proud of you, Ingo. And I bet I don't even have the first idea of how proud, yet." 

Next is Lucas. He stares wide-eyed and silent as Ingo fixes the feed rope onto the harness, before catching himself and saying, "I'm glad Dawn had you. Not just because of things like this, but also exactly this. Thank you for helping to keep her safe." 

As Ingo scrambles for a way to convey there was no need for thanks, Lucas swallows hard and approaches the edge. Barry calls out for him, and he musters up a sure smile. "Onward?" 

Ingo nods, and Chandelure guides him down.

Iris follows. "The Unova League arena is up on a mountain, you know. I usually fly, but maybe we can hike it together when you're home. The two of us might scare off the local trainers before they have a chance to reach me, though."

She's so impossibly light that halfway down panic seizes his chest, and he has to rear back to ensure she's still attached. Her smile glows under Chandelure's light and she shouts up, "I'm gonna replace Dad's gym maze with climbing walls!" 

Dawn's at his side as he hoists up the rope for the fourth time, and anticipates each motion of the rope to knot the harness after careful observation of her predecessors. When she climbs down, she skips past footholds in controlled falls that forces Ingo to rush to feed rope fast enough. When Chandelure vocalizes their shared dismay, Dawn laughs and calls up, "I'm making up for lost time! You'll thank me when we make it out of this mountain before midnight."

Admittedly, Ingo had noticed the temperature plummet as the sun crested its highest point and fell again behind the clouds. After starting the descent, the snow picked up again, albeit receding out of his awareness given his complete focus on the task. She was right. Any time saved was likely a blessing. The rope slackens, another groan from Snorlax bouncing up the passage walls as Dawn flops onto him. 

Leaving Emmet last. He stands a distance away, arms folded tight around his chest. Alone except for Ingo, his smile drops into a thin-pressed line. Ingo waits. 

He scrubs a hand over his face, and on the third beat he strides forward, saying, "I hate this. For the record." 

"I know."

Like Dawn, he knows where to hold his arms and when to duck and lean for the loops that tie around his shoulders and waist. Sneasel waits at the edge, eager but unwilling to proceed without Emmet. Ingo feels a spike of uncertainty at allowing her, still so young, to descend on her own, but can imagine his Lady’s incredulity at the notion of one of her own kits not being trusted to climb Mount Coronet. Unlike his brother, who is gangly and stiff in his harness, uncertain as he grabs the length of feed rope in his left hand and tries to mirror the others' right-handed stance. 

"Check safety?"

Ingo tightens the knots and presses a firm, hopefully grounding, hand on his brother’s shoulder. "Everything’s ready."

Emmet peers over the edge again and breathes a shaky laugh. "Okay. Everybody smile!" 

With a wobbly grin, he steps down and backwards to the first foothold. Ingo can see the exact moment his stomach drops out in the turn of his brow and the quirk of his lips into a brief, fleeting grimace. "I am okay," he rasps, more to himself than Ingo, and then he descends below the rim.

He punctuates his descent with shouted reminders of how much he hates climbing and what a terrible time he is having, which Chandelure and Sneasel answer with encouraging chirps. Minutes pass. Ingo feeds the rope at a careful pace, guided by Emmet’s jerks as he pauses to steel himself, and eventually he lands on the rock with a soft tug and a low, relieved whine that echoes up the cave walls back to where Ingo waits. 

Another minute, and Elesa shouts, "Rope's free. Your turn!"

Haxorus nudges into his shoulder with a soft grunt as Ingo draws up the rope for the last descent. He thanks her, and returns her to the pokeball. With one last look behind him towards the whitewash horizon, Ingo yanks hard on the rope once, twice, before quickly running it through his legs, over his chest and around his back in a more haphazard belaying harness, shifting his pack so that the rope can cut diagonal between his shoulder blades. 

On the occasions where he would climb without his Lady's aid, which grew in frequency after Dawn earned her favor and therefore her time, it was up to Ingo alone to guide travelers through the mountains. Knowing that his strange way of speaking and odd demeanor wouldn't comfort the average Hisuian, Ingo took it upon himself to acquire and demonstrate skill enough to earn his passengers' trust. It would not befit a Warden of the Coronet Highlands to be incompetent at navigating his own tracks. 

Ingo steps back over the ledge on hands and feet, wedging his boot into the first toehold and relishing the rush of wind that whips at his hair. His left foot follows, flat against the adjacent rock. The wound on his hand smarts as he grips his brake, his left hand dangling below him loose around the trailing rope. 

Ingo sometimes relished those chances to climb independently, without Lady Sneasler. Before Jubilife and the Training Grounds, but after Hisui became familiar enough to no longer fear, the absence of a real challenge wore on him, mind and body. The climbs assuaged that yearning, all dizzying heights and breathless leaps of faith. It’s not dissimilar to how Emmet described the subway, the balance of rush and certainty, the flow of battle and the flight of the car along the rails. 

Ingo tenses his legs and gathers force to vault off the rock wall, and drops. There's the moment midair, between footfalls against sheer slopes, that Ingo doesn't think. He only falls. 

This time, the gaps are short, and Ingo swings back against the tunnel wall only a meter down. For the better, given how Emmet swears from below. With Chandelure hovering beside him, it's a few quick leaps before Ingo lands to the ground, boots scattering a cloud of dirt as he digs his feet into the earth. His knees falter in their joints, likely a consequence of this very activity, and his shoulders ache as his pack jostles on the impact. Weightlessness only lasts so long. 

Emmet says, for the second time today, "What the fuck." 

Recovered composure quickly follows, more than an hour lost to the descent. Ingo and Chandelure direct them forward, down into the innards of the mountain that wind and coil towards the Icelands. It's hours still until they reach the end, but Ingo knows the route as if he laid the tracks himself. And so he leads them ever onward.  

Their mountainside camp lies buried in a fresh blanket of snow when Ingo wakes the next morning. The caverns led them, as he had hoped, to a fissure in the mountainside that spilled out to the woods that lined Route 216. Barry's excitement at the newfound ' shortcut ' confirmed his suspicion that, climbing aside, the tracks he remembers were far more direct than the modern routes. Ingo allows himself a small surge of pride. 

It was nightfall by the time they emerged all the same, and after clearing the treeline they set up camp in an icy thicket near a small log cabin, a lodge for trainers on their League journeys. The lodge lacked the facilities for all seven of them, but the kind patron had provided warm drinks and promised a hot meal come morning. The generosity of the Icelands folk evidently remains. 

Iris is awake when he pushes back the flap of his tent, leaving Dawn, Barry and Lucas to their huddled nest of sleeping bags for a little longer. She greets him brightly, "Good morning, sleepy-head," as her Hydreigon regards him with mixed interest across her three heads. Her Archeops and Rhydon arrive out from the pine tree perimeter with sticks and branches in tow, a neat row of logs already set in a hollow dug out of the snow. 

"I travel a lot," she says by way of explanation. "And Dad's way of coping is ensuring I am prepared for any problem. He's the same with Emmet, except Emmet is old and therefore thinks he doesn't have to listen."

Ingo smiles, exhaling a soft laugh. "I did notice that you fared better over the past days. Drayden is an excellent teacher, unruly students notwithstanding. I wonder if some of his lessons stayed with me when my memory of him did not, in the same way that my lost memories of you may have shaped the relationships I built with Lian and Dawn.” 

She sniffles, running the hand that was petting Hydreigon's second head across her eyes. " Stop, " she draws out, sniffling again. "You'll make me cry. It's too cold to cry." 

Ingo stumbles over to her side, flustered, and attempts an apology before she smacks him on the shoulder and says, "No, don't do that either. I just want to remember, that's all. I think it's getting to all of us." 

Ingo drops, slow on sore muscles, to a seat across from her and busies himself snapping leaves and shoots off the collected firewood. "What do you mean?" 

"Huh? You haven't noticed? It's hard , Ingo. I don't know how to describe it. It's like I look at you and know exactly how important you are to me, but when I go to ask why, there's nothing there. And that feels like missing you, even though you're here again. It's obvious with Emmet, he's obsessing about it. But it doesn't feel right, either, the way Elesa keeps a little distance from you, so I just figured that's how she's coping."

Every light brush of her touch on his shoulder, every soft smile and laugh, had gripped Ingo with longing. He had thought he simply missed Elesa, or maybe that his incomplete memory meant he confused her relationship with Emmet to that of theirs. That Iris felt without knowing that the emotional distance was unusual washes over Ingo with unexpected relief. 

"I've just met Lucas and Barry, but you can tell it's getting to them, too. And Dawn. Forgetting hurts."

Forgetting is in Ingo's each breath, cold in his lungs. It is what first greets him every morning and it dances on the backs of his eyelids every night before he falls asleep. Forgetting is the view of the horizon where the landscape collapses into a single point, appearing small enough to grasp in his hand but elusively far out of reach. He hadn't known a moment in four and a half years where his instincts were not foreign and where he didn't feel a stranger beneath his skin, screaming to be known. 

If forgetting was meant to hurt how would he have survived it? Now there was something to be done, a destination to yearn for. But before? It hadn't hurt, not how Iris describes it in Dawn's fury, Elesa’s wariness and Emmet's intensity.

Forgetting left him empty, a hollow man in a hollow mountainside, eager to fill his emptiness with strangers' gratitude and the certainty that there’s work always to be done. 

Was there something wrong with him? 

Had he betrayed them, somehow, in living without the ache? Would they resent him for it when they knew? 

Nylon rustles behind them with a plastic hiss, and Ingo clings to the distraction. Elesa ducks out of their tent, flat of a palm pressed into tired eyes one after the other. "Heard my name? What're you up to?" 

Iris drags her gaze across him as she turns over her shoulder to greet Elesa. "Morning! Just thinking about home!" 

Elesa grins, hope washing the tired lines from her face. "I genuinely can't wait. I miss my apartment so much. I'm going to sleep for days once I'm finally back to my own bed." She sits down opposite of them, leaning back on her gloved hands. "You said we've got a day and a half left on the road?" 

Setting aside the storm of guilt that threatens to close his throat, Ingo nods and says, "Provided the weather holds. Snow is no issue but we'd have to make an unscheduled stop in the event of a blizzard."

Elesa glares daggers up to the hazy morning sky, snowless yet. "Then we probably shouldn't let them sleep in long, huh? How about I see if the lodge has coffee while you get the fire sorted? Then I'll do the honors of waking up Emmet and the kids."

It strikes Ingo as odd, then, that Emmet slept in past him. But he recalls Emmet making no sign of turning in when he pressured Ingo to forgo his planned watch over the camp so that he could sleep in the tents for once. 

The fire, courtesy of Hydreigon, is roaring by the time Elesa returns with mug handles precariously looped around fingers and a promise of hot food cooking. Passing Ingo and Iris their coffee and hot cocoa, respectively, she leaves the remaining two mugs nestled in the snow before stalking over to their tent. 

Emmet emerges moments later, sleep-addled and frowning with Sneasel following at his heels, his coat haphazardly drawn over his shoulders like a cape. Trudging to their fire, he picks the darker of the waiting drinks and runs a hand over his face before perking up, practiced. Sneasel sniffs at Elesa's waiting coffee before wrinkling her nose and scurrying to Ingo's lap. 

"Didn't sleep well?" Iris asks, a hint of concern behind her teasing tone.

Emmet takes a swig of his coffee and flutters his hand dismissively. "I hate camping. I will be fine. Caffeine exists for a reason."

Ingo hums, scrutinizing the purple circles beneath Emmet's eyes. "If we need to stay longer at this station for you to rest, we should consider--" 

"No."

The ice that slips into his inflection is far colder than the surrounding snowdrift. Ingo flinches, causing Emmet to wince and duck his head in apology.

"Sorry. That was rude. It's--" He pauses, cradling his coffee in gloved hands. "I have been tired for a long time, Ingo. More sleep won't fix me. Getting to Acuity will. I want to keep going." 

Iris leans forward to hug her knees, saying, "I guess we really messed up the point of this trip, huh? Are you going to go right back to work when you get back?" 

"Why wouldn't I?" 

Iris groans, but doesn't answer. Emmet adds, "You'll be welcome back aboard if you want the job, Ingo. I've seen to that." 

Sneasel growls in alarm as Ingo's hand freezes mid-stroke. "I hadn't considered," he starts, truthfully and therefore with a fair amount of panic now that he's on the spot. "As of yet, I lack the technical know-how necessary to contribute to station operations. I would be more a detriment than an asset in this state." 

Contrary to Ingo’s expectations, Emmet laughs. "There's the Battle Circuits. You're not lacking there." Then, he tilts his head and asks, "Won't you remember after Acuity?" 

"That's the assumption, “ says Dawn, approaching from the tent "But it's just that. An assumption. Our amnesia isn’t Uxie’s doing, so there's a chance we'll just have to heal the normal way." 

"But, isn't Uxie the Being of Memory?" Emmet asks, setting his coffee in his lap and fixing Dawn with a stare too intense for how quiet his voice drops. Dawn nods. "Then it can help. Shouldn't it help?" 

Ingo thinks of Elesa and Emmet, soaked and freezing, crawling out of the opening they bore in rock with torn, battered hands. He thinks of jittery pulses and skin like ice, of blown-out pupils and slurring speech. He thinks of the cold. 

Lucas, approaching the fire with Barry, puts Ingo’s apprehension into words. "I don't think we have a reason to believe the Lake Spirits would be doing us favors. I know you're convinced, Dawn, that they and Arceus mean us no harm, but the trials so far haven't been charitable. Plus, Azelf and Mesprit were gone by the time we finished. Shouldn't we assume Uxie will be the same?"

Emmet blinks twice, exhales, and then smiles again, facade and guard at once. "Yep. That makes sense. It would be very unfair to leave you both without your memories, but we have to be prepared for all contingencies." 

Where the conversation meanders from there, Ingo does not hear. Behind the blood rushing behind his eardrums, he hears those words again from the same quiet voice, years younger.

"We have to be prepared for all contingencies." Busy hands press a bag into Ingo's arms, full of papers and miscellaneous Pokemon training accoutrement from their interrupted League Challenge. Emmet's voice, laced with anxiety, continues, "We don't know whether we'll stay together. Uncle Drayden may not want us both. I know we said we'd delay. But if we're separated I need you to promise. We'll meet in Nimbasa and start again. That way we stay together." 

Ingo tastes panic like bile. He doesn't mean to, but he shouts at Emmet, his voice still rough from sobbing at the funeral that morning, "How can you say that? Uncle Drayden would never do that to us, I can't believe you would even consider it!" 

Emmet flinches, his whole body seizing in a visceral jolt. Guilt and fear closes around Ingo's throat, and he can feel angry, frightened tears threaten to overflow. He needs to apologize, because Emmet looks near enough to shutting down, but then his brother jabs a finger fierce towards Ingo's chest. 

"You don't know! You don't know that for sure. You can't." 

Then he crumbles. First his face, glare crumpling to a wobbly frown, then his knees buckle and he folds to the floor. "People--everyone likes you more. Even mom and dad did. What if Uncle Drayden doesn't want me when he has you?" 

Ingo is at his side in an instant, Emmet small and shaking in his arms. "I won't let him. I won't let that happen, okay? I'm here. I'm not going anywhere." 

"Ingo?" 

Blinking, Ingo finds Elesa crouching in front of him with a bowl of soup outstretched, blue eyes narrowed and searching. "Are you crying?" 

Chatter around them falls quiet. Elesa winces, mouthing an apology. Perhaps she could have not announced that aloud, but Ingo can't find it within himself to be bothered. He feels disjointed, lost in a moment he can’t imagine having forgotten. Emmet, his twin brother and best friend, had once believed with everything in him that he was somehow deficient in comparison to Ingo. A notion which Ingo had spent their adolescence dissuading him of, reveling in the confident, joyful person he got to watch Emmet become. Or, rather, the confident adults they became together. 

Until--

He blinks the tears from his eyes, takes the soup and says, "My apologies. I…I found myself diverted onto a memory. I recalled Emmet and myself in our youth, and I was caught up in the emotions of it." 

Elesa's eyebrows jump, and she pivots to look at Emmet, who holds his own bowl frozen at his mouth, staring at them like something caught on the tracks. He swallows hard and appears as if he's about to speak, but then snaps his mouth shut. Ingo neglects the tug of memory drawing him to rush to Emmet's side, still catching up to reality and how it had changed them. How he couldn’t stay. 

Emmet says, "When?" 

You won't remember. You shouldn’t remember. "I would say you were--we were--about Iris's age. We were shifting tracks from our home to Drayden's. You were afraid."

For a moment, Emmet softens as he pulls back into recollection. Then, tense again, he jerks his head, saying with a stiff shrug, "I remember being afraid. And lonely. I wanted everything to go back to normal, but it never would." Unspoken is Ingo's absence, erased entirely and with it their conversation. Gone were his assurances that they would stay together. It would be ironic if it didn't ache. 

That ache is the difference between memory and insight. 

The insight that Emmet is his twin was a diversion on the tracks set by some unseen switch. He did not know and then he did. This knowledge had settled neatly back into the perfect-fit recesses where it has always belonged.

Ingo has remembered before, flashes triggered without warning during his battle with Emmet or Mesprit's trial. Flickers only, how he met his Pokemon, Iris's tiny hand warm in his, Emmet's younger voice, learning on library floors how to navigate panic attacks. These moments were nothing compared to the torrent of emotion and detail that Ingo reels with now, but sensory still. 

And so it aches, collapsing his chest inward and rattling his lungs with every breath. Setting Sneasel by the fire, Ingo abruptly departs and tries to occupy his hands by dismantling their camp. There's no distraction, though, from the echoes of Emmet, as a boy, afraid of being left behind, because scaffolding rears up to place the memory in context, fragments of certainty that make sense of what he now knows. Their League Challenge disrupted. Emmet, fiercely protective of Ingo's withdrawn disposition, the subject of more rebuke because he was always the one to stand up for them both. Their parents lost in an instant. 

Emmet watches him, his stare like an itch Ingo can't reach. Ingo wants to go to him, but hesitates on the catch of uncertainty that yanks his thoughts towards the years he is still missing. What could he say?

In the cave beneath Lake Verity, Emmet had wept with the sudden weight of responsibility he should not have to bear, with hoarse insistence that he could have prevented this and apologies Ingo did not deserve. When Azelf closed off Valor's cavern, and when Emmet emerged with a blue-tinged pallor under Chandelure's pull, the terror that gripped Ingo was beyond any fear he had felt in the Hisuian wilderness. 

Every moment since finding his brother again proved how much Ingo cared for Emmet. And from the very beginning, Emmet had demonstrated time and time again that he felt the same. 

So why taunt him with what they had lost? Not when there was no force in the world beyond the trial ahead that could make Emmet remember. 

The feeling of being watched resolves into footsteps crunching in the snow, drawing closer. Emmet, braver than him, crouches beside Ingo to yank at a zipper on the tent that wouldn't give, pulling it free so that they could collapse the fabric and fold it down. As they move to the next, Emmet smiles at him, wide and bright, and says, "We will remember, both of us. With or without Uxie's help. I will make sure of it."

"I know." It shouldn't be on him to take responsibility. The last trial could have killed him and yet he was already prepared to rush into the next. But, how to convey that without implying doubt and causing another panic? Better not to hesitate, better to trust they would survive this. If only it wasn't Ingo's nature to worry.

"I…" he starts, the words he intends disconnected from the thoughts that circle his mind. Simpler, then. "Thank you. I'm glad you're here, Emmet. I am glad that our two-car train is coupled once again." 

"Of course! I am Emmet, you are Ingo. This is where I belong."

It's mid-morning at the point they set out, warm with coffee and miso soup, their Pokemon fed and their route thoroughly debated. Ingo leads with Dawn and Lucas, Froslass and Sneasel a pace ahead, unperturbed by the snowfall that begins soft and picks up now as they push forward into the tundra, catching and swirling in the steady gusts of wind from the west. They keep close to the woods, the line between the route and the wilderness marked by patches of dirt and brush before the tall trunks and wiry branches of ice-capped pine trees intermingle in fractal arrays of white and brown, nigh impenetrable. 

Everything is awash in a snowy haze, endless white stretching ever northward. The wind carries the clean smell of ozone but burns at his exposed face beneath the hood of his Pearl Clan tunic. There are miles yet to go. 

Dawn complains of a headache an hour into their trek, low enough under her breath to be drowned out by the crunch of snow beneath their footfalls. Lucas and Ingo both hear, regardless. 

Ingo responds first. "Should we delay?" 

"No. Absolutely not." 

Then Lucas. "You shouldn't over-exert yourself." This earns him a glare, which he rebuffs with a nervous laugh as he shoves his thermos in her direction. "Stay hydrated, at least. You know that dehydration expedites hypothermia?" 

Dawn rolls her eyes but takes the bottle, anyway. After a swig, she says, "I'm wearing, like, five layers. The Galaxy Team had me wandering around up here in less. I'm not gonna get--" She cuts off with a hiss, bringing a gloved hand up to pinch at her forehead. 

They pause, Ingo hovering a hand in front to catch her if need be and Lucas wrapping a hand around her unoccupied forearm. A moment passes, snow dusting her shoulders and melting in the stray wisps of hair that spill from her braids. When she rouses, her pupils widen and dilate as her focus shifts from Ingo and Lucas to the surrounding tundra. 

"I… I'm okay. Sorry. Just caught me off guard. Let's keep moving," she says, pressing her hand on Lucas's so that he lets her go and trudging forward into the snow. 

Ingo's frown deepens. "If you're unwell, we should divert course. There's nothing to be gained by--" 

She waves a lazy hand over her retreating back, not bothering to turn around. "I said I'm fine! Come on, let's go."

A few curious Snover waddle in closer from the tree line, a sure sign of nearby Abomasnow. The snowfall is heavy enough as is, a defensive blizzard would do them no favors. Gritting his teeth, he strides ahead to keep pace with Dawn, beckoning Lucas along. 

Silence falls between them, the only sound the steadily escalating chatter between Emmet and Barry behind them as their discussion of type combinations grows heated. Dawn folds her arms around her chest but wades ahead with her back straight and her head held high. 

Ingo starts to consider the similarities between her careful fronts and Emmet’s masks, but the thought dissolves as his sensations fall away one by one to make way for a sharp, sudden pain at the center of his forehead. He buckles, hands dropping to his knees as he folds in on himself. The pain radiates from that single point inwards, reverberating off the walls of his skull in an echo that doesn't diminish. White encroaches on his vision, haloes mixed with falling snow. 

"Ingo?" 

Lucas sounds frightened. 

White-black-white, Ingo blinks and still doesn't see. White-black-white-red, Lucas's hat, then his and Dawn's faces in his space, wide eyed and worried. Voices behind them, Emmet and Elesa, and the sound of crunching ice and snow. 

"I'm--" Ingo starts, but his voice is wrong, too quiet, too rough. 

"I'm not going to take on the rest of the League." Ingo's voice carries across the marble foyer and bounces off the vaulted ceiling walls. 

"What?" Emmet asks, joining their uncle in an incredulous stare that Ingo cannot hold. He looks away and to the floor, at the scuffs of mud they left on perfect white tiles coming in. He bites down on his lip, knowing he avoided this discussion long enough but wanting to evade it a little longer still. 

"What was the point of all this then?" Uncle Drayden asks, his shiny shoes stepping into Ingo's narrowed field of vision. "It's not a question of whether you can win. I'm certain either of you has what it takes to be the next Champion. It's just a matter of who." 

Ingo's stomach turns again, like someone is wringing him out, like it does every time the subject comes up. His mouth is dry. Even though his voice shakes, he says, "That's the problem, if we take on the Elite Four, at the end it will only be one of us. It means someone has to lose, and just one would be Champion. It's not fair, so I've decided that I'll take a different route."

"But--Ingo, we've been training for this! Why didn't you tell me?" 

Isn't it obvious? Does he really need to explain? 

Unlike their uncle, Emmet doesn't approach. Ingo folds in on himself, shoulders dropping and arms wrapped around his chest. The pattern in the marble wobbles and blurs. 

Uncle Drayden lays a hand on his shoulder, and it sits on him like the weight of the world. "You both battle incessantly. You barely needed to take on the Gyms to train, what with your endless efforts to one up each other. Why would this be different?" 

Ingo doesn't know. It just is. Instead, he says, "I've made my decision. I'm going to apply for university in Nimbasa, where I'll have plenty of opportunities to battle while I study." His heart shudders, a caged Pidove slamming against his larynx, but he manages to bite out, "Emmet, you should still continue on. I'm certain you'll win, and you'd make a great Champion." 

"That's stupid. You're being stupid."

Dragging up his head, Ingo tastes the argument like fire on his tongue, but, when he meets Emmet's eyes, all words fail him. Emmet glares at him--really, genuinely glares--and Ingo can’t move or think. So Emmet continues, "This was your plan? Lie to me and assume I'll do what you think is best? Fuck that--" 

"Language, Emmet."

"Sorry. Not really. I need Ingo to get it. Why would I take on the Elite Four alone?" 

"To win?" 

And Emmet laughs. "You idiot," he says, breathless and grinning. "Winning isn't fun without you."

Ingo swings with the force of someone shaking his shoulders, nausea climbing up his throat. Elesa, not Lucas or Dawn, resolves into view, all blue eyes and the yellow wool of her scarf. The edges of dark around his vision subside and Lucas is a step behind Elesa with Iris at his side. Sneasel claws at his pant leg.

"Hey," Elesa breathes, hands shifting to cup his face. "Are you okay?" 

While he searches for words, movement in the snow, running bounds, approaches from behind and then an arm wraps around his bowed-over back. Emmet, a voice before a face, says, "What is it?" 

His head throbs. Pushing himself up hands on knees, Ingo shrinks back from the attention. Elesa pulls back, hovering fingers half bent in the air between him. Emmet's presence at his side recedes. Ingo's breath catches. Suddenly he yearns to drag their worried hands back and hold them in his. 

At his right, Dawn, voice stretched taut, says, "You’re remembering. Right?" 

Painstakingly, Ingo cranes his neck to look at her, intending to ask her how she knows, but finds her pale and drawn, Froslass hovering nervously by her side. So, he asks instead, "You are, too?" She nods. "Why didn't you say?" 

"You'd make us stop. I think that's a bad idea." 

" Dawn ," Lucas whines, trudging towards her with Barry pulled by the forearm. "Neither you or Mr. Ingo look okay to keep going right now. Why shouldn't we stop? This is hurting you!" 

Dawn looks past her friends towards the clouded horizon. There's still so far to go. Ingo understands her haste, but--

"I think this is Uxie."

That isn’t what Ingo was expecting. The others share his sentiment, a cacophony of confusion rippling through the group. 

Dawn elaborates. "Right after I caught Uxie in Hisui, I asked it to help with my memories. I didn't know at the time that my amnesia was an accident and thought, hey, I had to catch the Being of Knowledge as part of my task for Arceus. Maybe it was part of the puzzle."

Ingo smothers the spike of betrayal found in not knowing, but still starts to ask, "Why didn't you--" 

"I thought I was going to die," Dawn interjects, scrunching her hand over her forehead. "The pain was unreal. Like my brain was being torn apart. It stopped before I remembered anything, and offered to try to do it not all at once, but I figured Arceus could fix it without the pain. Wrong, again!" She cuts off with a bitter laugh, running her sleeve over her eyes. "I had hoped that… I don't know. I didn't think."

The snow falls across the gap between them like a gossamer curtain. Emmet's hand is back, gripping hard on Ingo’s forearm, and he pulls forward to say something until Dawn pitches forward with her head in her hands. 

Barry and Lucas crowd her before Ingo can start to pull forward, gloved hands tight around the bunching nylon of her coat. Froslass climbs into her arms, humming soft melodies, but Ingo imagines that Dawn is not present to hear.

A moment, no more than a minute, passes in strained silence. As his headache eases, Ingo wrestles with the options before them. If she's right, there may be no version of this that avoids these episodes. If she's wrong, then continuing puts her unnecessarily at risk of injury. 

When she lifts her head again, she fixates immediately on Barry, dragging him in by the sleeve to hold him closer, shoulders shaking. Ingo makes a decision. 

"Emmet, I need your assistance." A quick nod in response. "Were it not for the risk of derailing on account of my own episodes, I'd do so, but we must accommodate the circumstances at hand. I need you to carry Dawn."

"What? No, I'm--" 

At the end of a haphazard salute, Emmet interjects. "Yep. On it." Dropping his pack from his back unceremoniously into the snow, Emmet marches towards her and says, "No complaining! Safety first. Follow the rules, Dawn."

She groans but otherwise offers no protest as Emmet couches down to help her onto his back. He winces as he pushes up on unsteady knees, but says for Dawn to hear, "Light as a feather!" 

Iris says, quiet behind him, "What about you, Ingo? I think we'd need a Pokemon to carry you and none of ours are really suited for this." She gestures to the icy expanse in all directions with a bitter sweep of her arm. 

"I will lead, and therefore set the pace. Absent another solution, I'll simply have to slow you all down when need arises."

Ingo goes to hoist Emmet's discarded pack when a flash of red resolves into Infernape, snow sizzling where his mane sweeps the surface as he sniffs at their surroundings. In lieu of explanation, Barry bounds towards them and directs Infernape to gather the bag in his arms in Ingo's stead. Ingo's protests meet a dramatic shrug as Barry says, "Nah, it's the least we can do. You said it yourself, all of this memory stuff will slow you down. Think of it as me turning the balance back in speed's favor." 

And so they set forth, Ingo and Barry leading, followed by Elesa and Iris with Emmet, Dawn and Lucas at the back, all more clustered than their usual marching order. Ingo casts constant glances over his shoulder, to which Emmet responds initially with thumbs up and later with a shooing gesture. Which, fair, Ingo deserves when there’s more need than ever for him to focus on the path ahead.  

The next memory surprises him again, hazy white billows of snow fading to a sudden dark. They are children again, always together, flanked by Tynamo and Litwick. They are unprepared for the might of their tiny challenger and her two Emolga, and after she resoundingly defeats them, she shoves out her hand to shake and introduces herself as Elesa. 

Ingo comes back to himself with Elesa holding her hand on his shoulder, anxious and determined at once, and he is baffled by the notion that he could ever forget her when she had rolled into their lives like a storm that never let up. 

Tall, languid-branched pines disrupt the flat snowdrift as the afternoon sun shines through the endless gray skies, granting them a brief reprieve from the snow. As afternoon wears on, the distant hills breach the horizon and bright, primary-colored dots, skiers, zip and weave down far mountainsides. Barry has taken to chatting at him, and Ingo does his best to listen, but he drops in and out of the present even without the onslaught of memory at the edges of his perception. 

For the most part, he focuses on Sneasel, always a single pace ahead, ears constantly perched and twitching at the signs of unseen movements tunneling beneath the snow. Infernape's fiery mane and chattering punctuations to Barry's points manages to stave off the few curious Pokemon. The Icelands feel bereft without them. Ingo had noticed that Pokemon were fewer across Sinnoh's many routes, but here the difference was stark, the landscape almost devoid of any life but their own. 

He starts to recall Gaeric's tour of the areas surrounding the Pearl Settlement, some time after that first winter in Hisui, when the pressure banding around his forehead redoubles. Ingo expects it this time, holding out a hand to signal the group pauses. Reality shifts again. 

As young men, barely adults, Ingo and Emmet navigate a bustling platform in matching green uniforms, pausing to guide stray passengers to the correct trains and most convenient exits for their planned destinations. The rush of delight that accompanies the incoming train that marks the start of their shift aboard is nothing compared to the wonder and elation that courses through Ingo when he returns to the present, able to remember Gear Station again.  

The cold is distant as he blinks the Icelands back into view. It is easier along the next stretch, with thoughts occupied with the context that gathers at the fringes of the memory. The idea of his work, of what a subway is and the function it serves, slots neatly into the gaps where his identity beyond a brother, a nephew, a trainer had sat in wait. Before he can catch himself, he's rambling to Barry about Depot roles and procedures that arrive unbidden, fractured still but starting to cohere into the pieces of a whole. 

It doesn't last. 

Ingo believes he understands the pattern, the sudden onset of pressure behind his skull at semi-hourly intervals marking the coming memory. His confidence leaves him unprepared. It's no more than thirty minutes, less than a mile's distance, when his vision tunnels without warning. The dark swarms at his periphery, and all he can see is a flash of purple on white as Sneasel senses his distress and turns to him before what remains of the present falls away. 

Gloved fingers press firm on glass, haptic feedback vibrating through fabric against fingertips. His text reads: ' Break at 1230. Lunch? Same place.' 

Three dots flash on the screen for an instant, bouncing once, then three emoji appear on the screen: an old-fashioned train cab, a bowl of ramen, and two raised hands with palms out. Satisfied, Ingo flips the closed the dual screen of his Xtransceiver and diverts from the center of the platform to the Signal Room at the far east end. Overuse fades the numbers associated with the pin on the lock system and the buttons stick in their sockets. Ingo makes a mental note to plan system-wide checks on RTO cabinet security fixtures.

Shutting the door behind him, Ingo's eyes adjust to the dark spotted with red lights along the line of levers on the interlocking machine and the green and blue pinprick lights across the indication panel. Muscle memory guides his hand to the light switch on the left wall, and above him yellow overheads flicker on, one panel unlit. Ingo makes another mental note to have the Depot agents pare down which platform facilities are operating off the oldest infrastructure. 

With a sigh, Ingo unfastens his pokeballs from his belt and places them in the tray waiting on the desk. The electrical cabinet is ajar, left by the ill-equipped communications coordinator that detected the fault on the signals off Platform 3 earlier that morning. While not technically his job, Ingo is here and has a spare minute to resolve what should be a straightforward issue. The cabinet door creaks on its hinges as he pulls it open. 

Between blinks, everything changes.

Weightlessness steals the air from Ingo's lungs with the certainty of a fall to come. His effort to gasp finds his lungs frozen and empty. Hands fly to his throat, but the desperate burn of suffocation that he expects does not follow. A moment passes. He does not fall. 

Floating, Ingo swings his head to each side to make sense of what the Signals Room has become. The surrounding dark is deep blue, like a starless night sky, and otherwise empty. Until, that is, a point of light appears far ahead of him, pulsating to send out concentric circles of golden ambience out towards him through the void.

Ingo thinks of the headlights of an oncoming train. 

Before instinct sets in, the light unfolds, growing larger and expanding into shapes and then a figure. Oblong limbs, quadrupedal, and an ungulate body, haloed with curves dashed through by four points. It is a Pokemon, and one that Ingo does not recognize. 

This is where his heart would race, but nothing beats in his chest. 

"Welcome to my realm, located beyond both time and space." 

The voice is as close as a whisper directly beside his ear, but clear and unstrained. Despite the cavernous void around him, it does not echo, does not boom. It simply is. 

"I have brought thee here with purpose."

Ingo attempts to speak, a thousand questions bubbling to the surface of his thoughts, but each word dies on his tongue. He has no voice. Instead, he gapes at the luminous figure with increasing awe and dread. 

"I am that which humans call Arceus." 

Fear and confusion collapses into a single sure thought: he is dead. He is dead on the floor of that Signal Room and this is the gate to an afterlife he never made time to believe in. He is here to be weighed and measured by the God of Creation. He is only 27.

"No. Thine life is not lost. Thou shalt live, and shalt find thyself in a world strange to thee." 

Panic spikes, his hands still hovering near his throat grip fast to the fabric of his shirt and coat. Arceus knows his thoughts, so he forms words like prayers in his addled mind. "I cannot leave. You cannot ask me to abandon my station with no warning. What of my partners? My brother?" 

The figure undulates, golden light flaring with power and intent. It is too bright to look directly at, he knows, but Ingo cannot tear his gaze away. The voice returns, tone unchanged, loud and quiet at once. 

"Thou art needed. I have chosen thee among thy peers for this task. Will thou not preserve the world which holds that which thou hold dear?" 

Before Ingo conjures the words, the answer flares in a deeper part of him. His soul, perhaps, or his heart that knows if given the choice to protect those precious to him, the choice is already made. What choice did he have?

The weightlessness dissolves with the sudden lurch of his stomach bottoming out. Gravity's pull restored, wind billows his coat out around him as he plummets. There's no air in his lungs, but somehow he can scream. 

"Forge partnerships with Pokemon and demonstrate thine ideal to me beside thy partners as the ancient hero once did. "

The light fades, receding into the distant horizon, and Ingo falls. The ground, an endless expanse of white, rises to meet him. 

On impact, the world bleeds to black.

Chapter Text

Ingo drops. 

There's no warning. Ingo is mid-explanation, outlining the subdivisions of the Maintenance and Engineering Office nominally to Barry, but loud enough that Emmet follows the one-sided conversation with delight. Everything is fine. Dawn is heavy but secure on his back. The snow eddies and swirls around them but imposes no further delay beyond what’s necessary to accommodate the memory episodes. As much as Emmet wants to keep to schedule, the compounding minutes lost while briefly idling are a fair price to pay for Ingo to remember. 

Emmet isn't paying attention. Elated with Ingo's newfound knowledge, he's corroborating his description of Gear Station to Dawn as he carries her, meaningless elaborations meant to help her smile between memories. 

As he looks back to the way ahead, Ingo collapses, boneless, into the snowdrift.

Dawn yells in his ear, drowned out by Emmet’s own ragged, frantic breathing as he gapes at Ingo's crumpled form in the snow. Dread roots his feet off balance where they fell mid-step. Dawn pounds on his shoulder. 

Move. Move. 

Legs burning, chest heaving, Emmet hauls himself and Dawn forward, Dawn sliding off his back as Emmet sinks to his knees at Ingo’s side. Elesa is already there, cradling Ingo's head with a hand at his neck. Barry is babbling beside her, trying to explain that Ingo had seemed fine until he wasn't, that he hadn't had time to react. Mirroring Elesa's instinct, Emmet yanks off a glove and grabs Ingo's limp arm. Digging fingers between sleeve and glove to the sweat-slick skin there, he searches for and then counts the thready jumps of his pulse. 

"Still breathing. He's in a cold sweat," Elesa says, disrupting Emmet's count. "What do we do?" 

He helps Elesa turn Ingo onto his side, his head still cradled in her lap with her bright yellow scarf an impromptu cushion. Emmet resists the urge to snatch it away, some combination of first aid training and unpleasant encounters with alcohol suggesting that anything under his head could obstruct his airways. The scarf is small and what comforts they can offer may matter. This isn't an incident at the station or the bad end of a night out. They are in the icy wastes of Sinnoh, and there isn't a reparable cause to blame. If Dawn is right, and this is Uxie, there may not be a medical solution, even if one could reach them.

Emmet considers rushing ahead and finding Uxie himself. He considers fighting it and making it restore what’s theirs, without this needless struggle in the cold. His legs run rigid, tension coiling with potential energy that has him ready to surge forward and ahead alone. 

No. 

Useless, selfish rage does nothing to help Ingo. And that's what matters, right? Not his knee-jerk impulses, but his brother laying unresponsive in their arms. Ingo needs help, not Emmet's self-righteous temper. 

"I don't know," he mutters, hand trembling around Ingo's wrist. "I have no protocol for this." 

As Elesa starts to respond, Ingo gasps, guttural and urgent. His eyes fly open, scouring across Elesa above him and then over Emmet, and he tears his arm free to struggle backwards on his hands. Emmet rears back before a boot looking for purchase jams into his knee. Ingo bowls into Dawn and Iris, swinging a glance over his shoulder before scrambling, swaying, to his feet. Emmet cannot move, any coherent thought awash beneath static fuzz blanketing his brain.

"Stay away," Ingo says, pitch dropping low and caustic as he back-pedals. He almost falls again when the knee-high snow doesn't give way to his urgent steps, sending another startled look behind him as he steadies himself with hands out. Chandelure bursts out from her pokeball, and Emmet can see how Haxorus vibrates at his belt. Haxorus is right to hold back, as Ingo reels away from Chandelure's attempted help with arms shielding his face. "Get back!" 

Comprehension slams back into Emmet’s system, driving him to his feet. "Chandelure, stop. Behind me." She trills twice in quick succession, a frustrated rebuff. Emmet understands, he really does, but Ingo shrinks back from her like she could burn him, and so he points one finger sharp to the ground beside him and says, "Now." 

She obeys. He is her trainer too, after all. 

Ingo lowers his arms, just slightly, so that his glare shows over wrists and clenched fists. There's no sign of recognition when Emmet steps forward. He wants to scream, throw up his hands, demand that Ingo recognizes his own face in Emmet’s and realize that they're twins. Shouldn’t Ingo know instinctively that Emmet and Chandelure could never hurt him? But, had Emmet recognized Ingo as family at first? 

No. The notion had been at the bottom of a list, less plausible than any manner of Pokemon fuckery that he and Elesa could conjure up. And Emmet had been safe, surrounded by family he remembered. With that security, he could treat Ingo like a curious little puzzle-box until Lake Verity swept away any vestigial uncertainties beneath the emotions’ tide. Ingo doesn't have that surety. Wherever he thinks he is, whatever he thinks is happening, he must believe that he is entirely alone. 

Emmet fans out a hand behind him, signaling the others to stay down, and then sweeps both hands in front, palms out. Drawing up pieces of his script reserved for lost children on subway platforms, he says, "I am Emmet. I am here to help. Everything is going to be okay." 

At Emmet's name, Ingo recoils. At Emmet's assurances, he shakes his head and throws another glance over his shoulder at the looming treeline. 

Would he be able to keep up if Ingo fled? Definitely not, not through the woods. Anxiety spikes in his chest, catching in his next breath.

"I will not hurt you," he tries, straining to mimic the way Ingo's voice can soften into gentle certainty. "You are safe. Please let me help you." 

Emmet drags a foot up and forward through the snow. Then another. Ingo holds, but his shoulders curl forward and his fists stagger in what would be a threat, were his hands not shaking. When Emmet is an arm's length away, Ingo jerks his fists and says, "Not another step." 

Emmet can hear the please underneath. 

"You are Ingo," Emmet says. "You won't hurt me."

He has no plan for if he's wrong.

He could catch Ingo by the arm and hold him there if he turns to run, but there's every indication that will do more harm than good. Except, there's no version of this where he can let Ingo wander the woods alone. Not a second time. There was no Sneasler or local clan to save him now, only them.

And they were out of their depth. 

So Emmet holds his breath, watching Ingo watching him. Ingo tightens his fists, and for a moment Emmet is certain he’s about to eat his words. With a desperate edge, nearing hysterics underneath, Emmet repeats, “You won’t hurt me.”

Something shifts. 

Glassy, unfocused eyes blink into clarity. Pupils dilate. Gray irises exactly like his own shift left-right, left-right over Emmet’s features. A breath escapes like it's punched from his lungs, Ingo's entire form receding as he lowers his hands, still shaking, to his side. 

"Emmet?" His voice is wrong, little more than a whisper and lined with disbelief. Another searching glance passes over him, and then Ingo says with breathy relief, "Emmet."

Then, "I'm sorry. I'm so sorry." 

There's urgency in his tone that Emmet goes to dismiss, finding the easy reassurance that Ingo has nothing to apologize that’s quickly become habit. What's a little forgetting between brothers, at this point? 

But Ingo continues, "I thought--I lost myself, again. I couldn’t…I didn’t know …I've forgotten once and I can't bear to again, not when forgetting derailed me, and you, and Arceus's entire damned purpose for me the first time."

What? 

Ingo breaks eye contact, dropping to stare at the snow. A thousand questions smother Emmet's every thought as he grasps at the context he must be missing. 

To the toes of his boots, Ingo says, "It was the same, just then. The memory--Arceus...I…" He runs a hand through his hair, gripping tight at the ends. "I wasn't meant to forget, but still I did. I failed before I even set my course. And in doing so, I forgot you. I cannot--I will not do so again. Not when the first time cost us everything." 

Emmet's heart breaks. 

One stride and Ingo is in his arms, startled and then easing into the embrace with a shiver. Right hand pressing Ingo's head into his shoulder, Emmet gathers a fistful of pink sweater and says, "Not your fault. Never your fault. You can ask everyone. Nobody blames you." 

The still silence of the others holding their collective breath gives way to a chorus of agreements, and Ingo’s last caution drains away. He wraps his arms around Emmet's waist and his shoulders shake with tears smothered in nylon. Chandelure announces herself with an apologetic trill and nudges her way beside Ingo's cheek, gentle warmth a boon in the wind that Emmet allows himself to notice again. Sneasel purrs loudly at their feet, chirping sympathetically each time Ingo's breath catches in a vain effort to recover his composure. 

Part of Emmet wishes he could release all their Pokemon there in the snow and collapse into their love and warmth, calling it a day. But there are miles still to go. The tug of his own memories on the severed ends of his emotions pull like a magnet towards Acuity, and thrum like an electric current in his veins. 

Emmet's hold tightens, his heartbeat falling in line with the refrain echoing in his head. I will remember, I will remember, I will remember. We will fix this and whatever fault you feel for forgetting will not matter. It will be done. It will be better. 

He wants to cry. He wants to sink into the snowbank and weep, and hold his brother in his arms as if there wasn't the gap between the life Ingo now knew, if in pieces, and the one Emmet could imagine. 

Not yet. Not yet. 

Another shuddering breath, and arms fall away. Emmet tries not to feel their absence. Ingo pulls back, bringing a hand to pinch the corners of red-rimmed eyes. Emmet frees his fistful of Ingo’s sweater, some distant thought to how old and precious it is for him to risk pitting the fabric. 

Hands shift to Ingo's shoulders, squeezing once, and drop.

Unbidden, Ingo says, "I remembered Arceus redirecting my course onto the tracks it laid out for me. I do not know if I managed to follow them, but I suspect not. I didn't understand--I didn't have enough time to comprehend what it wanted of me before I lost everything. I was too concerned with not wanting to leave."

Unsaid is that Ingo didn't have a choice. 

"Just then, I couldn't reconcile where I was and who you were. I thought I was--I apologize for delaying us for so long now. I can assure you that there's unlikely to be a memory quite as disruptive as encountering a god during routine electrical maintenance from here on out."

The confirmation that Ingo vanished at the station--under his watch--stings.

"Delaying?" asks Elesa, the upwards lilt of her doubt in time with her movement lifting to her feet. "That sounds like you think we should keep moving. Are you sure that's a good idea?" 

What else can they do? They can call for aid, maybe Cynthia, but Emmet felt firsthand how Dawn would slacken and threaten to collapse when memories hit. Emmet couldn't allow Ingo to fly. There were no reasonable precautions they could take that would justify the risk. Then, none of their Pokemon beyond Dawn's Froslass were equipped for this environment. Perhaps Rapidash could carry him, but the ice would melt as he walked, and the last thing they needed was a Pokemon with a broken ankle miles from the nearest Pokemon Center. 

It wasn't safe. All of this. Nothing about this last leg had met a single, reasonable safety parameter. They should have rerouted to camp the moment Dawn started showing signs of being unwell. 

But if she was right? If this was inevitable? Or if failing to persevere accounted for failure in Uxie's eyes? What then? The force of these memories, hitting both Ingo and Dawn at once no less, couldn't be a coincidence. So, as guesses go, Dawn's felt accurate. 

Where does that leave them? 

Ingo says, "Our destination will not find us if we idle here. I fear we have no choice but to press on. Believe me, were there a way to transport us there under safer conditions, I would be the first to advocate a diversion from our set course." Turning from Elesa's transparent disapproval, he addresses Dawn, "How are you feeling?" 

"A little nauseous from all the jostling, but fine. Nothing that hit me like whatever that was for you. But I never forgot meeting Arceus." 

Ingo hums, thoughtful, and lays a hand against Chandelure's glass. "I want to trust my instincts and believe both in the pattern I’ve observed so far and my hope that there's no memory left that can stall my engine so thoroughly. Yet, I acknowledge that my assumptions did not matter just then. I can't promise that this won't happen again, nor can I say with certainty that it won't get worse." With sudden intensity, Ingo rounds on Emmet and Elesa again, his stare cutting through the anxieties that stir in Emmet at each word. "If this is the cost of remembering--truly remembering and not relying on the thin hope that my brain will heal on its own, I will face it. I apologize for suggesting in the past that I would have us run from this. I was wrong." 

"Now you say that because you're the one who might get hurt," Elesa says, reaching past Emmet to grab Ingo's forearm and yank him by the sleeve into a hug. After a beat, she twists her other arm to pull Emmet in and says, "I'll never forgive you if something happens to you. Either of you. I need you both to be okay." 

"We will," Emmet says into the fabric of Ingo's sweater. "I promise." 

"You can't. You don't know that for sure." 

Ingo answers, "No, but I will do everything in my power to ensure we arrive at our station unharmed, however perilous the tracks ahead. You have my word." 

Elesa releases them both with a reedy “okay, okay,” into the space between them, and spins to face the kids, jabbing her finger at each of them in cadence. "That goes for you, too. No one is getting hurt. We need everyone to look out for one another, which means I'm going to be careful to the last, and I'm trusting each of you to be the same." 

A haphazard line of salutes, all out of time, follows. 

Emmet grins and throws out a commanding point towards the gathered kids. "Nope! Try again. This is Gym Leader Elesa. Put your backs into it!"

A glance passes between them, an unspoken agreement for Barry to take the lead. Under his breath, he counts down from three as sidelong watches wait with readied hands, and four hands snap, crisp, to attention in an imperfect but much-improved salute.

Elesa cackles, a little undignified and altogether perfect. Emmet says, "Good! We'll make Depot Agents of you yet." 

With a last press to Ingo's arm, pleased with the wobbly smile on his face, Emmet hustles over to Dawn and holds out a hand. When she's on her feet, he crouches again and cuts off her beleaguered sigh with an "All aboard!" 

Then, once he's back to his feet with her in tow, he adds, barely above a whisper, "You brought Ingo home. The least I can do is carry you towards yours."

Even if she's heavy. Or, as he's realized over the past few days, he's weak. 

This time, the group clusters closer to Ingo and Barry as they proceed. Emmet hovers a step behind Ingo's elbow until Iris points out that to catch Ingo, he'd risk dropping Dawn and more than likely fail to help either of them. So he settles for keeping close to Infernape so that his circle of warmth reaches Dawn, as she feeds him berries from her pack as thanks for weathering the constant onslaught of snow and hail on their behalf. 

Sneasel, evidently not an ice type in this form and too big now for coat pockets, is bereft to find Ingo occupied and Emmet's hands full. Lucas catches on after a few forlorn whimpers and gathers her in his arms, filling the quiet with gentle assurances and the occasional observation about her typing and how she differs from modern Sneasels. She preens at the attention. 

Within a half hour of setting out again, Dawn flinches and then wanes on his back. It doesn't get easier to hear her in pain and feel her disconnect from reality, more often than not returning to herself with muffled sniffles. She doesn't share, holding her memories close to her heart out of some instinct Emmet doesn't understand. But to hear Cynthia tell it, Dawn's life before Hisui saw no shortage of strife. 

He remembers distantly paying attention to the news, years ago now, when Sinnoh saw a spike of criminal activity that culminated in a terrorist attack on a national park, evidently Lake Valor. The events in Sinnoh only registered because of his own constant dealings with Team Plasma, always looking to cause problems on the platforms. Now, Emmet wishes he paid more attention. Then, perhaps, he would have more to offer as Dawn comes to with a fluttery exhale, arms pulling tighter around his chest and neck. 

Still, it's only conjecture. He can hope that her memories are kind, that he's mistaking longing for distress. But there's no reassurance he can offer beyond the steady slog ever forward. 

Soon. The mountains to the north filter into view between gusts of snow, gloomy masses looming across the horizon. Emmet knows the one by now, a mountain beheaded into a rough-hewn plateau. In its basin, Lake Acuity sits placid in wait. Uxie expects them. 

Emmet wonders if it knows their memories or just controls them. Does it understand what it's keeping from them? Would it look at Emmet and recognize within him a version who hadn't been alone? Would it see Dawn and Ingo, and know exactly what it stole? 

Would it care? 

Ingo holds out a hand. Silence falls as Barry and Elesa tense to catch Ingo if he threatens to collapse again. Emmet can feel his pulse throb in his jugular, the physical exertion of their hike no comparison to how fear sends his systems awry. 

The seconds drag, and it's never more than seconds before he recovers, as Ingo draws his hand to his temples. Emmet counts.

At 42 seconds, Ingo exhales and drops his hand. Holding firm, he rolls his shoulders to adjust his pack and mutters under his breath. 

"Ingo?" 

After another word that Emmet can't catch, Ingo nods and turns quickly between Emmet and Elesa. "My apologies for worrying you. I am alright, and I remembered our friends this time. In more than name, rather." He looks to Iris. "We were celebrating your victory in your father's house. I have faces now for Skyla and Lenora, and I can recall Alder and Clay. It seems we were fairly well connected?" 

Iris beams. Emmet releases the breath coiled in his chest. 

As they set off again, it's to the melody of Iris, Elesa and Ingo comparing stories, filling in the blanks where Ingo always belonged. Emmet doesn't relax, not entirely, but the raw edges of his nerves ease somewhat. It's a start.

On the horizon, Lake Acuity’s plateau draws nearer. Emmet levels his sights on its monolithic heights and marches onward. 

Afternoon drains away to evening. 

Soon. 

The tracks curve beneath them as the Yellow Line train winds inward towards Gear Station, sending Ingo for the nearest handhold as Emmet widens his stance on the cusp of another command to swing with the car as it veers with the turn. The kids across from them lean into the arc, as unphased by the swing of the car as with Ingo's and Emmet's combination, familiar by now on their fifth attempt. 

Haxorus is down already, leaving Ingo with Archeops as Emmet encourages Excadrill to make her last poison jab count. They both know the girl's Serperior well, an odd combination of staunch defenses and lethal speed. Its only weakness is a single typing and relatively, for its defenses, low health. Excadrill will have to make it count. 

Vanniluxe, meanwhile, smiles blithely at Archeops, cooing with a shudder as it exhales the beginnings of blizzard. Less than ideal for Archeops and Ingo. 

Excadrill cries as she succumbs to a leaf storm flurry far too fast to counter, purple poison still collecting on her claws. Eelektross phases in red then blue as Archeops buffets the snowstorm that rushes up from beneath his hovering talons. Ingo calls him back the moment his eyelids flutter closed, wings half-folded as he starts to plummet. 

Flashing a wide grin, Emmet catches a handhold and uses its leverage to lean towards Ingo and cuff him on the arm. "Boo! Bad luck!" Eelektross needs no direction to round on Serperior with gastro acid bile pulling from his gullet, so Emmet adds, "Lunch is on you!" 

Ingo manages his most deadpan expression, no real feat, and settles back onto his heels to watch the battle play out. Torn between watching his brother fight to the last and witnessing these determined, hungry challengers as they finally near victory, Ingo pulls back against the plastic seatback to capture the moment in its entirety. 

As Serperior falls, the girl releases Scrafty. An odd choice for a second rather than a setup, but it certainly doesn't matter now. Eelektross is built to last, but not in a two-on-one with a hasty Vanniluxe and a Scrafty that entered the fight with bulk up. Emmet and Eelektross will not concede quietly, however, and light up the car with a blinding discharge that leaves Vanniluxe paralyzed and slowed. 

It takes two more rounds. Ingo feels the chill from three successive blizzards seeping through the fabric of his uniform coat. A well-aimed drain punch square to Eelektross's open jaw sends him reeling, then down. As Emmet whispers soft gratitude to a now-occupied pokeball, Ingo steps forward. 

"Bravo!! Really excellent! The best combination of you and your Pokemon. It is incredible!" 

Emmet pulls together his composure and his script with a genuine smile. "I am Emmet. We lost against you again. But I am satisfied. You are too strong! The strength you have, your trust in your Pokemon, their never-ending support!" 

On cue, Ingo continues, "When you and someone else combine, your engine powers something special! If you like, please challenge us with a different combination." 

"Yep! It was the most fun battle ever! Please come back soon!"

The kids stare at them, seemingly unable to comprehend their victory, before their heads swivel towards one another. They break out into laughter, the girl surging forward to pick up the boy by the waist in a crushing hug. 

Ingo steadies himself with a slow exhale as his vision unfurls into the familiar white expanse. He is seated, the nearby fire warm against the chill, and there is a weight on his shoulder. A sidelong glance confirms Dawn leaning against him, sleeping soundly. In the quiet, he repeats his drills.

His name is Ingo. 

He traveled here from Hisui, but he is not from there. 

There, he was the Lady Sneasler's Warden, and a member of the Pearl Clan. 

He taught new trainers, fearful still of Pokemon but eager to understand the bond they could share, how to battle and form partnerships. 

The girl beside him is Dawn, the hero of Hisui, chosen of Arceus, and the Champion of Sinnoh. She traveled with him from Hisui, but she is not from there. 

Ingo is another chosen of Arceus, sent to Hisui with a mission that he forgot upon arriving. He can remember it now, but does not understand what was asked of him. 

Ingo was once a Subway Master of the Battle Subway, one of the two bosses of Gear Station. The current, sole Subway Master is Emmet, his twin brother. Emmet knows him but does not remember him. Ingo remembers Emmet as he was before Hisui. 

Does that mean he does not know him? 

Irrelevant. 

Their best friend is Elesa, the Gym Leader of Nimbasa City. Their uncle, Drayden, is the Opelucid City Gym Leader and their cousin Iris is the Champion of Unova. 

He--

"You back, Ingo?" 

Blinking, Ingo lifts his head to find Elesa at his unoccupied side, pressing a thermos into his hands. He nods, and she says, "Drink that. We're melting and boiling off more for the road tomorrow."

Ingo obliges, and the water is cold like the air is cold and bites like blades down his throat. It tastes different from what he's used to, an undercurrent astringency that always accompanies the water here in the modern day. Who would have thought he had spoiled himself during those years secluded to the mountains, only drinking fresh spring water? 

"What’d you remember this time?" Elesa asks, low as to avoid waking Dawn. 

"Losing." 

As intended, Elesa has to catch herself on a sharp laugh. "Not all good ones, huh?" 

Ingo shakes his head. "No, it was. It was similar to when I started losing consistently to Dawn in Hisui. There reaches a point where you can't help but cheer them on. Even Emmet was proud of them." 

With a thoughtful noise, Elesa says, "I can see that. I'm always excited for the challengers at the gym that have to keep coming back. There's something so exciting about watching a trainer you thought you understood show up entirely different and better for it." She scrunches up her nose and adds, "Every time I beat Emmet he's extremely annoying about it. Why do subway challengers get treated better?" 

"PR," Ingo says simply, then considers. "You always won when we were kids. Emolga mature quickly and we couldn't keep up with Blitzle."

Elesa gives a faux gasp, turning over her shoulder to where Emmet, Lucas and Barry are setting up camp. "A grudge? Our Emmet? I'd never." 

Ingo remembers this, now. Not enough, never enough, but the familiarity resounds in the core of him like wheelsets running along the rails. Like something made to a perfect fit. Arriving in Hisui, he had learned that he had a family almost immediately. But he did not understand. Not until now. 

It puts into sharp relief his relationships in Hisui. How Lian, so similar to Clay that it aches to remember them both now, was so eager to have a novice Warden to ostensibly mentor and ultimately befriend. How Irida and Palina felt him safe to confide in. How Kamado's stern countenance had been so easy to trust, if only at first. There were echoes of home in every bond he forged. 

Elesa says, "Do you think you're going to take the job at Gear Station again?" 

Careful not to startle as her voice plucks him from reminiscence, Ingo considers the question underneath. Will their lives go back to how they once were? 

Dawn's weight is steady and familiar on his shoulder. Behind them, Lucas groans as Iris and Barry exchange terrible jokes. Sneasel snores softly in a bed of snow just far enough from the fire that she's warmed without overheating in her insulated down. 

Ingo thinks of the Pearl Clan, of the Security Corps and the trainers he taught at the Grounds. He thinks of Clay with Lian's face and Lucas with Rei's. Did Lian grow up to look like Clay? What differences filtered down from generation to generation? He recognizes that Lucas is older than he ever saw Rei, and would grow older still. 

He thinks of Snowpoint City, their destination beyond remembering, and the history beneath its foundations. Did the Temple still stand? Did the people there know of their predecessors? Was he among them, a once-Warden twice out of time? 

Then, he is also Ingo, once a Subway Master. There's only the years between then and now, between what is and is not left of him.

He is Chandelure's partner and he was Gliscor's. He was a guide once and a conductor before that. He is not as young as he once was, but younger than he once believed. 

These dichotomies don't lend to decisions. 

A man divided stands at the crux of a diversion, where he must decide which tracks that lead him towards the person he wants to become. Decisions were not part of this, before. Arceus did not care what he wanted. The Icelands did not bend to his desires. For the Pearl Clan, he became who they needed him to be to justify their resources spent. When Lady Sneasler asked him to be her Warden, had he ever imagined refusing her? 

Would choosing to follow the tracks that circled back to who he was before count as a choice? 

The man that he was, who could not leave, who would never abandon his station, left all the same. It wasn't a question of whether he could attempt to be that person again, but one of shoulds and woulds . 

The last thing he wants to do is pretend. Ingo had spent four years pretending at an identity, cobbled together from the pieces of him left in Arceus's wake. He has had enough. 

To Elesa, he says, "I would need to recertify. Whether or not my qualifications remain valid, I do not trust my memory. I may feel as if I am starting to know the rules and procedures, there's no telling whether there are gaps that I cannot perceive. It would be unwise and unsafe to consider otherwise." 

Knowing, now, how he and Elesa used to be makes the avoidance taste like a lie. 

Elesa side-steps his attempt to divert, of course, whether by her nature or because Emmet and Ingo have this tactic in common. "Well, sure, but that's an after-the-decision complication. Somehow I don't think recertifying is going to make or break it. What's actually bothering you?" 

Ingo brings up his free hand to scrub at his face before thinking better of it, not wanting to inadvertently signal another incoming memory well ahead of schedule. Instead, he lets his hand linger mid-air as if the coherent, worthwhile answer will appear in it like magic. It does not. 

"I--It feels… I don’t know if I have an actual answer, Elesa. What if by trying to recover how things were before I make it worse for all of us? I know, truly, that none of you will hold having changed against me, that's not my concern. But, I also know that nothing good will come of rerouting my course in order to avoid a problem that I've conjured up in my head. Yet, still I stall at the notion of being asked to make a choice, for fear I'll make the wrong one."

"What is the choice that you think you're making?" 

"Whether I'm capable of living up to the person I was. For the Subway, for you and Emmet. For everyone."

Elesa exhales a soft ' oh ', and Ingo has to look away from the sorrow that pulls her expression into tight curves, shadows in the firelight. She's not one to pity, though, and she pitches her voice lower to ask, "And if you're not?" 

"I've always had a trajectory. Even in Hisui, when I couldn't remember my destination, Arceus had tracks for me whether or not I was capable of traversing them. I am… averse to being directionless. I need routine and schedules to prevent me from derailing. So, when I say that I do not know, please understand that uncertainty is not an easy escape. Not for me."

His volume picks up inadvertently and Dawn stirs on his shoulder, pulling herself upright with bleary eyes that turn quickly alert. "Is everything okay? Something going on?" 

This, inevitably, catches the attention of the rest of the group, various sounds of concern and alarm drawing near until Ingo explains that, yes, everything is fine and that he only forgot his volume again. To Dawn, he adds, "Perhaps with the tents in working order you should retire for a proper rest?" 

She scowls at him but relents without argument, hauling herself to her feet and mussing up Ingo's hair before saying her good nights to the others. 

"And what about you?" Emmet peers down at him. "You ran in overdrive all day. Get some sleep." 

Ingo frowns up at him, recognizing Emmet's point but also unwilling to concede to it. After all, awake he can remember. "I'll feed my Pokemon en route to my station. I trust you will follow your own guidance?" 

Anticipating but not waiting for the sputtered false assurances he would surely receive, Ingo pushes himself up and trudges past the fire. The temperature drops outside of its immediate circle, warmth receding beyond the ring of soft orange reflecting pink on the snow. He releases his Pokemon at the hazy edge of the firelight, relieved that the worst of the blizzard abated at nightfall. 

Haxorus emerges from her pokeball with a snort, butting her head into his chest with a careful adjustment of her tusks. Crustle and Excadrill follow, stumbling over the snow to nuzzle at his pant legs. "Ah," he mumbles, realizing. "I must have worried you all. I apologize for my derailment earlier. While I cannot promise it won't happen again, I will do my best to do my safety checks going forward."

Garbodor completes the mob, phasing to full size behind him and wrapping her ungainly arms around his shoulders, much to Haxorus's dismay. Ingo allows the attention for a moment longer before disentangling himself to distribute their meals. 

Stirred by the commotion, Sneasel scrambles over to join. Chandelure remains in her pokeball. Still sulking, evidently, after Ingo admonished her from breaking free without permission. He knows how he trained her now, and she showed all signs of taking advantage of Emmet's leniency with pokeball protocol. Ingo combines her evening portion with the berries for the next morning and reminds himself to go easy on her. Twice now, he hadn't recognized her. For a ghost, he imagines being unrecognized and feared holds a different gravity. 

As Garbodor finishes the last of a day’s travel in wrappers and plastic, familiar pain resonates from the center of his forehead to the cusp of his spinal cord. No longer a spike of ice, it washes over him now in waves. Habitually, he splays his hand to signal to wait, which serves as a warning for Crustle and Sneasel as he lowers to the ground. Distantly, Emmet calls his name. 

The ocean breeze whispers through the neat row of sycamores that line the northern stretch of the promenade, the saltwater air more pronounced here south of Driftveil than he’s used to. Ingo closes his eyes to listen to the steady murmur of the evening surf against the posts, quieter than the burbling fountain behind him and the whir of the newly-installed electric lights that circle it. There's chatter beyond his corner of the pier, closer to the stadium entrance, and Ingo will have to join them soon. 

When was the last time he left Nimbasa? Their days of traveling seem distant now, buried beneath their work like the old Cold Storage facilities here that made way for Clay's new battle facility. It's quite the sight, truly, all neon blues and yellow against the tasteful greenery. The interior arenas were still under development, but the facility had been built with televised matches in mind, and so it served as a far superior location for their tournament than the Battle Subway would have managed. 

Iris and Emmet were ecstatic, of course. Attention became them, under the harshest lights they still bloomed. Ingo, however, limited his public persona to practiced interviews and PR forums. If Elesa is to be believed, this casts him as a mysterious, brooding figure that, apparently, only heightened his appeal. 

Emmet finds this hilarious. 

Ah, well. At least someone's enjoying themselves. 

A melody, airily hummed, carries over the sea’s rhythm. Ingo tenses inadvertently, his hands closing around cool metal railing and shoulder blades twitching. Only after his body moves of its own accord does he realize the voice sounds too young to be any of the media correspondents from earlier, who should all still be on Clay's facility tour. 

The tune continues, starting and stopping as little lungs struggle for the breath support to carry out the melody to resolution. Despite himself, Ingo smiles, fond of children and captured by the way the song settles alongside the running fountain and the wind in the leaves. He could almost hum along, the melody simple enough even if he does not recognize the tune. But there's no need to impose upon their privacy.  

Chandelure disagrees. Her pokeball jostles at his hip and she materializes some distance behind him with a bellsong chime that harmonizes with the last note hummed before the voice lifts into a gasp. 

Unbelievable. 

Ingo grips tight the railing with one hand and drops the other to pivot towards the open space where she emerged. "Chandelure," he starts, aiming to lower his volume as to avoid further startling the child. 

Said child, a girl with long, dark hair pinned under a white beanie, gapes at Chandelure before giggling. "Oh? Did you want to join in? I forgot where I was, though." 

Chandelure trills and twirls, bursts of joyful flame illuminating the girl's face. He recognizes her then, Cynthia's shadow on their preparatory calls and the impetus behind the upcoming tournament. "Champion Dawn," he greets her, inclining his head and lifting his hat just an inch above his head. "Please pay no mind to Chandelure. She is a curious Pokemon, but means no harm. Though, it seems you have already deduced that for yourself." 

Dawn lifts a hand from Chandelure's glass, sheepish. "She's a ghost type, right?" Chandelure phases out of view and pops up behind Dawn, trilling again. Dawn whirls, laughing. "Boo to you, too, silly."

"Yes, ghost and fire typing. Are there no Litwicks in Sinnoh?" 

Spinning back towards Ingo with a bright smile, she says, "Nope! The Professor said that Unova has a unique ecology, so we don’t have a lot of Pokemon in common between us.” 

Chandelure blinks to his side. Dawn makes another face at her, scrunching up her nose, while Ingo struggles to find something to say. He usually was better with children, but without the familiar backdrop of the subway or Gear Station, he's found himself adrift. 

Dawn comes to his rescue, squinting at him and saying, "You're one of the train bosses, right? Who I'm supposed to battle tomorrow? I'm really sorry, but I don't remember which one you are." 

"Subway Master Ingo. You needn't concern yourself with our names. My brother, Emmet, will be sure to identify himself, so you will need only to know that I'm the one he's not."

She tilts her head. Beneath round cheeks and large eyes, something perceptive crosses her expression in subtle angles. "Ingo. Okay, got it!" She thrusts out her hand to shake, drawing Ingo forward. He takes it, tiny and firm, and as she jerks her arm in an unpracticed but firm shake, she says, "I'm Dawn. Not Champion, unless we're on TV. Just Dawn. Nice to properly meet you, Subway Master Ingo."

When he releases her hand, she tilts her chin up to meet his eyes, and recognition courses through Ingo like electricity from the third rail. He knows a challenge when he sees one. 

"Don't think just because we're friends now that I'm gonna go easy on you. So you better not go easy on me. I'll know." 

Ingo marvels at this young Champion, no more than twelve, and pulls himself straight. Not to look down on her, but to carry himself like a man taking her seriously. As he should. Voice low and loud, he says, "I wouldn't dream of it." 

Five years and unimaginable distances later, Ingo comes to in the snow with Haxorus sniffing at his face, and wonders if some part of him knew her when they met again in the past. 

He bats Haxorus's snout away and announces to Emmet and the rest that he is, once again, alright. But he stays there, knees through trousers cold in the snowdrift, for a moment longer. In the wispy firelight where the warmth does not reach, Ingo contemplates fate. Had Arceus known, then, its plans for them? Or had that moment set them on the tracks of divine intent, the two of them inexorably caught in its tide? 

Green roofing tile is rough like sandpaper beneath ungloved palms and grit gathers at the nibs of his mangled fingernails. The air is thin and still up high, and the city’s racket twelve stories below him cannot penetrate the corrosive void that has seeped with the fog from Nimbasa’s canals. Emmet does not want to be here any longer. 

There is no way but down. 

Gear Station is an island amidst a sea of darkness. The skyscrapers rear up from the black like crumbling pillars to heights he cannot reach. He is a speck of white, a flickering glow of light, waiting to succumb to the unnatural night. He is a ghost. 

Ingo is not here. He left after Lake Verity's trial, after Emmet grabbed his hand to flee from his own wailing grief and the platforms split like tectonic plates between them to lead Ingo away from him on a train he could never catch. 

No. 

That's not right. 

Ingo was never here. 

It was always Emmet, cast in both roles, the figment of a brother lost and the husk of a brother left behind. One perfect and untouched by time in memory’s image. The other desperately wondering, questioning, begging for an understanding that would not find him in his dreams. 

He had his answers now. 

He had his brother now. 

For now. 

Ah-ah. The dark writhes inward now, ravenous, a near-ouroboros catching sight of its tantalizing tail. It draws near with thunder, rattling the rooftop like the subway rolling underfoot. 

Emmet braces his bare feet on the divots of long copper shingles. The ridges dig lines into his palms and heels where he holds fast. When the thunder abates, the black void lapping at the edges of the roof but not beyond it, Emmet isn't relieved. This is not respite.

When Emmet dreams, he remembers. Soon, with luck, the barriers would break, and memory would latch onto the parts of him that remain when morning comes. 

Which begs the question of whether any of this mattered. Would he, the grieving specter from the recesses beneath sleep, rise to the surface when Uxie freed his memories? 

Likely he wouldn't remember this relentless dreaming grief. This wasn't real, after all. 

Yet it was part of him. 

Would those years taper like blades with context? Would the memory, not of Ingo but of his absence, warp and twist as it had night after awful night? Would four years and five months of once benign--even occasionally happy--experiences become laced with a loss that, at the time, he hadn't felt?

The skyscraper spires quake as the dark rumbles once more, splinters of concrete rubble and shattered glass plummeting into the nothingness below. Gear Station rattles on its foundation. Emmet slides, barely an inch, down the slope of the rooftop. His heart jumps into his throat. 

Even here, he's afraid of falling. 

"Why am I here?" he screams at the horizon. More questions. He has no end of them. "Why do I remember? What good does this do?" 

There is no reply. No conjuration of Ingo, no flashbacks playing out before him with eidetic accuracy, no cacophonous chatter voicing his worst fears. His voice doesn't echo. There is only quiet. 

Bruised fingers ache like they're supposed to, but only as an afterthought. Sensation enough to remind him that he and the person he wakes up to be are one and the same. Same wounds, same scars. Some more mottled and knotted than others, left to fester untreated because they went unseen. 

Emmet lifts himself painstakingly to his feet, throwing out his arms to counterbalance as he skids another inch towards the ledge. 

He shouts to the void, "I am not afraid." I am terrified. 

The station shifts beneath his feet, crumbling foundation lurching inward. Emmet doesn't stumble, this time. This isn't real. 

The fear is. 

Of course, the darkness knows this. It's him, after all. All of his grief and rage and loss stirred up in the image of Azelf's hungry void. It circles him with predatory vigor, playing with its food. 

But Emmet is tired. Tired of forgetting, tired of waiting and wondering and wanting with a desperation that fed on him from the inside out. What good did clarity here get him if every morning he woke in the ruins of it, lost and frantic? 

He takes a step forward. 

Then another. 

The copper shingles warble beneath his feet. They aren't meant to bear a person's weight, and they thin out towards the edge of the roof. There's a humor in the accuracy that his subconscious maintains when it comes to Gear Station. 

"You win," he says with another trembling step. "I can't escape you. Nothing will make you leave. So I'm done asking. I'm done cowering."

The toes of his boots curl around the thin eave, and Emmet does not look down. "I won't be alone. When you finally have me, when I remember and you get your chance to swallow me whole. I won't be alone and that matters."

The dark laps at his feet and coils up his ankle, frigid like the flood beneath Lake Valor. It could yank him down and claim him now, but it waits with its rumble distant and soft, purring. 

"I'll survive you." 

Emmet tilts forward, pressing his bodyweight into the balls of his feet. Vertigo rushes up his throat as the weight finds no support and he pitches forward into the cold air. The darkness curls around him, a thousand welcoming arms ready to pull him down, down towards the end of him.

For the first time in four years, five months and 29 nights, he made a choice.

And so he falls. 

Emmet wakes up with his stomach lurching and tears in his eyes. Soft light filters through yellow nylon into their tent, and Iris and Elesa sleep undisturbed beside him. Bringing desperate hands up to smother his mouth, he stifles sobs into his fists until his vision no longer swims. 

Nails buried into palms, he steadies himself on the pain and gathers his courage. He drags himself out of the tent flap into the morning light and repeats the one fragmented thought leftover from his dream as he sets out to gather firewood alone. 

I will survive you. I will survive. I will. 

The noon sun cuts through the dwindling blizzard so that the snow gleams, bright and pristine, where they have not walked. At the foot of the plateau, Dawn guides them into a thicket of new-growth forest that blankets what was once Glacier Terrace. When Ingo notes the changed landscape, Lucas describes the Sinnoh-wide tree replacement program meant to mitigate the dwindling effects of urban sprawl on the region's fragile ecosystems. That there wasn't forest here to begin with, especially not one populated by cedars native to Kanto, matters little, evidently, from a regulatory standpoint. 

Ingo recalls the vast national park north of Nimbasa, and realizes he had more than once considered it a nuisance when considering line expansions. The Light Green Line had to bow out around it en route to Opelucid via Lacunosa, and more than once he had found himself an hour away from Gear Station after defeating the day's last challenger on the Singles Circuit. How things change. 

Ingo hasn't had another memory episode since his last while packing up camp this morning. A university lecture, profoundly unhelpful as far as his need to recover his technical expertise, given his attention was on Emmet's antics during what Ingo was certain was an important lesson. Ingo recalls that, after their first year, they had diverted onto separate disciplines. Nominally to diversify their specializations, but also so that Ingo wouldn't throttle his brother before they graduated. Emmet, somehow, could always recover from a semester of goofing off by cramming sleeplessly for a week before exams. Ingo could not. 

Since that memory, the headaches abated and with them the glimpses of his past. Dawn is the same. Their absence left him lost, caught between the yearning to remember more and the staggering scale of what he now knew. It occurs to him that this is what memory is, normally. Not vivid flashbacks, but the culmination of thousands of almost-forgotten moments into a coherent identity. Like climbing the Highlands, he did not recall every minute of those years in perfect detail. They filter into his perception like ghosts, at rest until he disturbs the grave-dirt above them.

As they scale the slope towards Acuity, Ingo settles into observing the present in sensory details. The undisturbed snow this far off-trail smells of cold ozone mixed with heady sap from the snapped branches overhead. Snorunt clusters chitter amongst themselves from behind the tangled brushwood as the group trudges past. Any warmth offered by the cresting afternoon sun is lost beneath the trees as wind plunges between thin trunks, carrying damp from the lake above. 

Whether by unspoken agreement or because no one will broach the subject, they do not discuss preparations for the trial. Far from the safest route, Ingo still finds himself unable to break the silence to insist upon a discussion. When he tries, he relives the moment that Azelf broke its hold on him. Confusion, eyes adjusting to unexpected light, contorts to realization and then fear as the ground quakes underfoot. A moment left on the turn of his heel, his hand acting on its own accord to send Chandelure in where he could not follow. The collapsing cave wall, the mountain of rubble, the purple shimmer of protect wasting Excadrill and Crustle's efforts. Rock meets shoulder, over and over again.

Uxie could render him helpless, too. A cruelty calling itself a trial meant only for those who cannot remember. 

So they don't prepare. There were the implicit understandings: to stay together under the best of their abilities, to treat Uxie with respect, to protect each other. 

The trees, old Hisuian firs, gather closer and bend around a clearing blanketed in frosted wild grass that moves as one ice-entangled mass in the breeze off the shoreline. The chill off the lake is frigid in his lungs, a familiar cold that he never grew accustomed to. There is no life but them, no fluttering Rufflet, no Basculin splitting the rippling current across the lake's surface. 

The world holds its breath in wait. 

Dawn grabs Ingo's hand. Emmet whistles, a sliding scale that bottoms out on a breathy laugh. A weathered, snow-capped ridge emerges from the surf, a cave certainly waiting on the south side.  

Buizel, Lapras and Empoleon phase into the waves, and Ingo scoops Sneasel, anxiously chittering, into his free arm. 

It all comes down to this. 

They cross the lake in two groups, Empoleon and Buizel making the trip back to fetch Emmet and Ingo after depositing the others on the island. 

"You ready?" Emmet asks, voice tight. 

"We have all waited long enough. We are setting things right." 

Emmet nods and raises his left fist. "Together."

Ingo bunches his right hand into a fist, jostling Sneasel into his other arm, and bumps Emmet's waiting hand. "Together."

They arrive on the island to find the others in similar states of quiet resolve. The water Pokemon return to their pokeballs and with a final, wobbly smile, Dawn leads them into the cavern. 

Gathering close at the edge of the array of standing water, they play their part and wait. After a breath, Uxie materializes at the far wall, head bowed to obscure its face, but for the familiar red gem at the center of its forehead. 

A voice resonates, gentle and clear, inside his head. "You seek the truth?" 

"Yes," Emmet and Barry say in tandem, echoes bouncing off cave walls. 

"So be it."

Ingo stiffens, pulling Sneasel closer to his chest and bracing himself to lose control. Emmet clutches his sleeve like a lifeline. 

With no additional preamble, with no warnings or attempts to dissuade them, Uxie vanishes. 

When the rumbling earth follows, expected by now, it's comparatively brief. Stone into stone resounds once behind them, a thundering slam, sending the standing water reverberating away from where they stand. Then, nothing. Futile tension rolls off Ingo's shoulders as a quiet dark settles over the cavern. 

Above the hush, Barry says, "Door's gone." 

Ingo releases Chandelure, and her light illuminates the flat rock wall where the cavern entrance once was, the exit sealed. The cavern stands otherwise unchanged as Ingo glances across the group, finding everyone accounted for, if uneasy. They all hold, waiting for the cave to crumble or the rock walls to break, but nothing happens. 

This is worse. Trepidation sends skin prickling up the exposed back of Ingo's neck. 

"Are we… waiting for something?" Barry asks, wandering forward into the standing water and throwing back his head to observe the ceiling, empty but for ancient stalactites dripping with frosty condensation. 

Dawn follows, Chandelure's firelight casting their reflections out in front of them in fluid colors. Part of Ingo itches to call for caution before pushing ahead, but the rest of him is at a loss. Both Mesprit and Azelf took action immediately. Uxie simply blocked the way out, and not with rubble that they could feasibly dig out of. It’s as if the entrance was never there. 

So, Ingo follows his second instinct and keeps close to the wandering kids. The water sloshes with uncareful steps as he strides forward, glancing across the walls for any sign of a way forward. Chandelure circles the cavern, illuminating dark corners and peeking behind stalagmites before returning to his side with a disheartened chime. 

Dawn gasps. Ingo whirls on her, throwing out his free arm to stave off a yet unknown threat. She’s staring at him. Him, and then sliding down to the water beside him. Ingo follows her line of sight. 

Warped in the purple-blue glow, his reflection is dark under the ripples in the water emanating from Ingo's feet. He glances down to his tunic, still light pink, and then back to the dark shape reconciling in the settling water. 

It is him. 

Well, reflections usually are. However, this wasn’t a reflection. Or, at least, not of his current self. The him in the water stares back at him with unlined eyes and a sharp frown, clean shaven and stern. He wears his uniform coat and hat, clean and pressed, over a white button down and blue tie that were lost to time. Sneasel isn't in his arms, in the reflection, which she takes offense to and tries to squirm her way free to investigate. 

"Woah, Dawn, it's you too," says Barry, and on cue Ingo and Dawn turn to find Dawn's reflection with her hair down and pinned at the sides, under a beanie that Ingo recognizes from his memory the night prior. Instead of her hiking jacket, she wears a black vest beneath an undone red peacoat, a line of six pokeballs attached to the waist of her skirt. Dawn waves her hand and her reflection waves back. 

She's not as young as he remembers her, when they first met, but younger still than now. 

Ingo follows the logic to Barry, whose reflection extends out in front of him in orange and white, flyaway hair wild without the winter hat smothering it. 

"It's memory, right? This trial?" asks Dawn, grabbing Barry's hand to make him wave and watching as their reflections mimic. "These are us from before?" 

Water splashes behind them as the others approach. Chandelure drifts away from Ingo's side, but his reflection stays as it was, the firelight frozen across the whites of his shirt, his features still perfectly visible. His mouth runs dry. 

The water stills again. Elesa draws in a hissing breath, and Iris comments on a dress that she hadn’t worn in years. A shape pulls behind his reflection, resolving into Emmet.

Emmet's reflection smiles up at him, eyes bright and features less wan and worn, wearing a perfect inverse of his own uniform. The reflection’s hand lifts as Emmet, behind him, pats at the space where his reflection wears his hat. 

Emmet laughs, saying, "Didn't realize I had aged--" 

His voice cuts off as, without warning, the floor falls away. The water vanishes as solid ground gives to nothing and Ingo plunges, Sneasel's claws digging into his shoulder as they fall. Shouts around him suggest that he's not alone, and he throws his head back to find Chandelure's dwindling light illuminating the others around him mid-drop. Panic follows his stomach up into his throat. 

Hard ground finds him before a thought can cohere, the impact at his back forcing the air from his lungs. Vision splintering into veins of white-hot light, he curls onto his side around Sneasel and groans, chest rattling. 

Another groan, louder with a far deeper resonance, sounds behind him as several impacts land nearby, somehow softer than his. Chandelure hovers above him and trills with concern. 

"Just--just a moment to catch my breath," Ingo mumbles, pulling himself into a tighter ball. 

Sneasel hisses into a whine, nosing between his folded arms until she can burrow out of his hold. Distantly, Ingo hopes her claws hadn't more than mildly poisoned him. 

A third groan, this one human again, follows a shuffling of fabric and leather grinding against a smooth surface. "D'you think we lose the trial if I--" 

Heaving, followed by guttural, choking coughs draws Ingo's attention to Emmet, hunched with his arms braced against a sheer, crystalline wall. His shoulders shudder with the force of each gasp, but he's up and breathing. Ingo pulls himself to his hands and knees and swings his head towards where the others fell. 

He mostly sees Snorlax. 

A warm pride overtakes the wish that he could have fallen just a little to the right. Chandelure trills again, waving her candle-arm is his face. He takes it and feels a psychic chill run down his arm and shoulder as she helps him to his feet. Upright, he can better take stock, finding Dawn guiding Lucas down Snorlax's gut and Elesa pressing her forehead to Iris's Hydreigon with Iris's hand clutched in her own. 

Ice stretches from floor to ceiling around them. The ground is dusted with gravel and snow, extending forward in a thin tunnel that refracts the light it gathers from Chandelure's flames in an ambient blue glow. The ceiling curves in a dappled mass of cold luster, supported by stalagnate spires. Ingo's breath gathers in puffs of white, the chill seeping through his tunic. 

Emmet recovers as Ingo strides towards him, pressing his forehead against the wall, likely soothingly cool, before pulling straight and dragging his sleeve across his face. 

"I'm fine," he grumbles as he steps out from the corner. Brushing Ingo's worried hands aside, he says again, "I am fine. I just want this to be over." 

It was a short fall. Not that he can see where they fell from. Ingo studies the ceiling again, trying to understand what transpired. 

There was nowhere else from which to fall, but no clear route in the sheet of ice overhead for them to have fallen through. 

The pain in his shoulder blades recedes and then dissipates. It's as if he had never fallen. Ingo turns to Emmet, feeling his brow knit before he has the words of the question, and Emmet nods. 

"Like it didn't happen, right? Sure felt like it did." His expression falls into a brief grimace, then pulls back into a small, reassuring smile. "We’re okay?" 

Ingo nods. 

“Okay. Good. Let’s go.” A last press to Ingo’s arm and Emmet redoubles toward the group.

When Ingo turns back, the Pokemon, sans Chandelure and Sneasel, return to their pokeballs to give access to the tunnel. He swings a last glance around the space around them as Dawn says, "Only one way to go, I guess?"

Ingo strides forward to join them. "Evidently that is our route. I will lead." As more a prayer than an order, he adds, "Stay close." 

With Chandelure at his shoulder, he presses ahead. Her light casts warped reflections in the ice, blue and pink and distinctly lacking the brick-red tones from his uniform jacket. A normal reflection, this time. He watches closely all the same, waiting for his mirror image to contort into something other, something lost. 

The tunnel narrows, barely enough for one across, forcing him to press gloved hands against the ice to push through. It rings out with the touch, resonance spilling from a single point like water disrupted by a thrown stone. Ingo draws back as if burnt, bumping into the wall behind him, which reverberates with a deeper tone and gives, slightly, to the touch. They halt, breath held, until the echo drains away. 

Nothing happens. 

Iris whispers, "That’s something, right?" 

Tentatively, Ingo lays a palm flat on the ice. It gives again, soft like fabric, and rings once more with a sound not unlike Chandelure's bellsong. The surface ripples, emanating across the western wall from the curve of Ingo's fingertips, until the echo fades. When the surface resolves, his reflection is once again wearing his old uniform coat, not quite pristine but not yet in tatters, a long slash running along his right sleeve. His reflection holds that arm pressed close to his chest, his tie wrapped haphazardly around his wrist with blood pluming red against his thin button-down. The same arm, real and held out with his hand against the ice, has a thin scar running from wrist to elbow that serves as a reminder of how lucky he was to survive. 

His reflection stares at him, blue-lipped and unfocused with snow crusting to disheveled sideburns and his hat. Ingo is certain, at first, that this is meant to be a memory, and his reflection will drag himself forward until he inevitably collapses for Sneasler to find, half-buried in snow. Until eyes narrow and lips part, his reflection stumbling forward as if to get a closer look at him. Ingo flinches, drawing his hand away. 

With a voice like Uxie’s, cold and clear right next to his ear, his reflection asks, “Did you remember who you are?”

Ingo blinks and swallows hard. “Yes,” he whispers. “Yes. We did. We remembered.” 

His reflection draws up straight, tilting his head back so that he exposes his face to the blizzard. 

His hat drops, disappearing from view. When he speaks up to the sky, his voice cracks like shattering glass, perfectly audible in his head. “Did we forget who we were meant to be?”

“What? No--I don’t know. What could we have been, after we forgot?”

The world tilts. Cold rushes over him like a plunge into deep water, choking his voice as lungs drown. He gasps once, capturing nothing. He can't move, hands frozen in place, unable to catch his fall, as he pitches forward. Dark seeps into his vision, snuffing out the last of the white-blue light. 

Then nothing. 

Slamming his fists again into the wall where Ingo just stood, Emmet shouts until his voice drowns out the eerie psychic resonance made by each fist hitting the ice.

He hadn't been fast enough. He had been stupid, so fucking stupid, following at the back again and not able to push through before that thing--not Ingo, not him, never him--reached out and yanked Ingo forward through the ice. The same ice that won't give now as he drives fist after fist into it. 

Hands pull his arms bodily back, and Elesa is shouting for his attention. He tries to yank free before the fight in him dies out, stopping him in his tracks. Elesa's grip slides from forearm to wrist, dropping into his gloved hand and pressing twice. For a moment he's disconnected, unable to send the signal from his brain to his hand to squeeze back. His hand twitches and the tendons follow on a two second delay, grasping back. 

"He's okay, Emmet. He's gonna be okay."

It takes all of his restraint not to tear his hand aways. Instead, he leans his forehead against the ice, which rings in response, and says, "How do you know?" 

Chandelure chimes weakly, and Emmet understands the logic. He asks, without turning to either of them, "You can still sense him?" 

Another chime. 

Okay. Pull yourself together. 

He counts down from three. This time, he does not smile as he collects himself and turns back to the others. He'll smile when it's finished. When it's fixed. Instead, he sets his jaw and inclines his head in apology, wondering distantly how many times he's scared the kids in under two weeks. 

When he looks again, Dawn is in front of him, pale but resolute. "Did you hear what it said? Did anyone?" 

Shaken heads and verbal negatives pass through the group. But Emmet had seen the reflection, pale and bleeding, reaching out to haul him forward through the wall. 

Elesa lets go of his hand and says, "Don't touch the walls. Don't interact with the reflections at all. Okay?" 

"What if we're supposed to?" Lucas asks, barely audible except for the close quarters. He repeats himself, louder and assured. "What if we're supposed to? We had to look at our reflections to even end up here. What if ignoring them isn't the solution?" 

He doesn't need to look to her to imagine Elesa's sour expression. Lucas has a point. So, Emmet says, "Don't interrupt them, at least. We need to figure out what Uxie wants.”

Elesa sighs. "Fine. And make sure to get everyone's attention if one shows up." 

Emmet leads now, Sneasel and Chandelure flanking him as if they have the means to defend against the power Uxie wields. He appreciates it all the same. His ragged breaths come out in wisps of vapor, the cold and damp familiar enough to set him further on edge. The tunnel winds and narrows so that avoiding the ice is all but impossible, but any time he touches the wall, only his own reflection stares back when the resonance rings. 

However many times his shoulders and hands brush up against the walls didn't stop it from being Iris next. 

Her reflection is younger, dressed in her Champion’s gown complete with her crown, hair collected into a high ponytail that Emmet hasn’t seen her wear in some time. She is inches shorter, years younger, and stares up at the actual Iris with wide, teary eyes. A pokeball is clutched in her small hands. Emmet and Dawn both rush to Iris’s side, grabbing a free hand each and squeezing silently. She pulls her head high and nods, and her reflection speaks. 

Emmet tries to read her lips, but the reflection is frantic and shakes her head with the force of whatever words Emmet cannot hear. Iris beside him says, under her breath, “She’s asking me what--”

Her entire body seizes, startled, as her reflection leans forward and shouts. To it, she responds, voice pitching up to a yell, “How was I supposed to? What could I have done?”

And her reflection’s hand leaps through the ice, ephemeral and unreal but no less tangible as it seizes Iris by the jacket and hauls her in through the wall. Dawn and his combined strength are meaningless against whatever force of Uxie's rips her from their grasps, both left with hands flat against solithat rings, hollow, at their touch. 

Before panic can set in, another voice starts behind them, a low whine resolving into "Could I have? That was always them, not me. Wasn’t I always meant to just follow along?” 

Barry slams down onto the floor as he loses grip on Lucas, helpless as another hand tows Lucas beyond the wall. He scrambles back to his feet, following Emmet's example and clawing at the ice. Emmet rounds back to where Iris vanished, the ice placid and unyielding, holding no sign of his cousin. To Chandelure, he begs, "Can you sense her? I know it's not the same as Ingo or me. And Lucas? Are they okay? Please ." 

Chandelure trills, bobbing up and down with a couple of quick flares of assent. Emmet drops his head into his hands and breathes through his fingers. 

The only way to help them is by moving forward. Uxie doesn't care that they're kids, it doesn't care that the memories it holds were theirs to begin with. 

"Can you go to them?" 

Chandelure presses against his shoulder, cold and warm at once. Her responding chime reads a negative, and Emmet's heart sinks. "Uxie has them? They're out of reach?" 

An affirmative this time, sadder still. "But what if we fought it? You have the type advantage." 

"Emmet." 

He makes a face at Elesa, unable to muster up the usual banter, and turns to Barry. Still leaning against the ice, Barry hums noncommittally at Dawn's low words, cheek flat against the wall with his face turned towards her. After she finishes speaking, he listlessly draws himself up and reels towards the tunnel, grabbing Dawn's hand in his. "Let's go." 

She nods, following without looking back towards Emmet and Elesa. Heart in his throat, Emmet allows himself a beat. Then, brushing a hand against Dawn’s shoulder, he motions for them to pull aside and steps out ahead. 

The tunnel widens, somehow making the space more claustrophobic as the refracting light gives the walls the illusion of inching towards them as Chandelure's flames sway. Still, it allows them to pair up, Emmet with Barry and Elesa with Dawn, as they continue on. Barry watches the walls for any change in their reflections, looking long over his shoulder for any sign, Emmet presumes, of Dawn's shifting.

So there's warning when it does, Barry sucking in a breath and darting out an arm ahead of Emmet's trajectory. He notices before Dawn does, her attention fixed forward. At first, she doesn't turn, only granting the ice a sidelong glance. 

Dawn’s reflection faces them, slightly shorter than her real counterpart, but not so different in age as Iris and her reflection. She wears a tee shirt and shorts--pajamas, maybe?--and curls in on herself with her arms folded over her chest. 

As her reflection speaks, Dawn turns to face the wall, breathing hard out through her nose and an indent forming where she pulls her cheek into her teeth.

Emmet couldn’t try to read her lips, as the reflection is evidently finished. She glares up at Dawn and waits for her answer. 

At first, Dawn only shakes her head. Emmet pulls an inch forward, frightened that somehow that would count against her, but the reflection stays within the ice. 

“Because I said yes,” Dawn says, tone flat. “I agreed. You should know.”

Emmet watches more closely now, catching pursed lips around w ’s ends on hard t’s. Worth it. Was it worth it? 

“Yes.” 

Emmet’s breath hitches.

The figure dissipates, and Dawn's true reflection reappears. Emmet exhales. She waits a full thirty seconds before letting her guard fall away, clasping a tight fist over her mouth and breathing hard into it. 

Emmet lays a hand on the ice and watches as the chime sends resonance in circles to the edge of the ceiling, waiting for his reflection to shift. It doesn't. Sneasel pokes at the ice by his feet, sending up rolling waves and adding higher notes to the sustained sound. 

Fabric shuffles, Barry coming up behind her to wrap his arms over Dawn’s shoulders. A sharp inhale, and Dawn says, "It’s us as we were before everything. Except it knows what happens.”

"Did you mean it? That it was worth it?" It’s fully based on an assumption, and perhaps an insensitive question. Probably, almost definitely one. Still, it could help to know whether Uxie could tell when they lie?

Dawn laughs overtop of another shaky exhale, catching on what sounds like the start of a sob. Emmet lets the guilt sting. "I think so? But I don’t know if she would agree." 

What did the reflection ask Ingo? Was it the same question? Certainly not for Iris, whose reflection wept and shouted. And Iris pushed back, asked questions instead of giving her an answer. As had Lucas. Ingo had fumbled, unable to answer at all.

' 'You seek the truth?' Uxie had asked. Emmet didn’t give the phrase a second thought. What difference was there between memory and truth? 

Ah. 

“It’s preparing us,” Emmet says as he considers it. “It wants us to prove that we can face what happened once we remember.” 

Dawn hisses. "'Arceus said this whole thing was about preventing the consequences of us disappearing. Why should that matter? We’re home. Why would--”

The ice rings out again where Emmet left his hand, startling Dawn from her line of thought. 

Recoiling, Emmet waits for his reflection to change with his breath caught in his throat. But the rippling settles and his face stares back at him, anxious and drawn, altogether too aged to be an illusion. 

Why is he disappointed? 

He decides it's just eagerness to complete the trial, to find Ingo and the kids. To remember. So, he nods once at his reflection and spins again to the others, pointing ahead. “We should keep moving. We’ll know soon enough, right?” 

It's within minutes that Barry catches his reflection changing, flashing bright oranges and greens, wearing the same jacket that Emmet remembers from the Doubles Circuit ages ago. 

Like Dawn, Barry now is slightly taller, and his clothing scuffed and worn, not unlike their own travel wear. 

At the speed his reflection speaks, there’s no chance for Emmet to even attempt to read lips. His reflection yells, throwing out his hands to punctuate a rapid-fire series of questions. Barry shrinks back, looking suddenly small beside his reflection’s fury with shoulders drawn in and head bowed. But he holds, the tendons in his throat bulging as he swallows down protestations until his reflection’s mouth snaps shut. Then he laughs. Shaking his head, he says, “You know why. We… We’re not like her. Even I get that, even without remembering. That’s not something we can change.” 

When his reflection fades away, he whispers something to Dawn, and Emmet forces himself not to wonder. His curiosity isn't necessary or helpful. To him and Elesa, Barry adds, “It’s, like, if you could go back to your past self and they know the worst thing happened, and your past self finds exactly how to blame you for it. So, you know, it sucks. Just a warning.”

Well. Emmet already had plenty of practice blaming himself. 

Perhaps that’s why he feels like Uxie is saving him for last. As they continue on, he throws constant glances over his shoulder and whispers to Chandelure to keep close to Elesa. 

It doesn't matter. 

Elesa's far enough back by the time it starts that Emmet almost doesn't realize what's happening. A sharp gasp has him rushing back towards her as she flinches away from her reflection. 

Her reflection has not a single hair out of place. Perfect makeup has her eyes shining a colder blue, her hands running her braid over her shoulder to cut a line through the soft shapes of her coat’s silhouette. Emmet realizes he can’t remember when Elesa packed away her headphones, but without them and, set against her pristine, composed reflection, the stress she carries underneath her mask is clear in contrast. 

Her reflection speaks, and she looks down out of the corners of her eyes in the same way Elesa does when she is annoyed at an interviewer or fending off the newest rumors. Elesa, real Elesa, pulls her hands to her face, and Emmet flutters his hands around her until he presses one hand to each arm. He aches to hug her, hold her close and make this stop. She didn’t deserve this. 

Neither did the kids, nor Ingo. 

Cruel. This is cruel. 

Elesa's breath catches, about to speak, and he squeezes her arms twice in an attempt to offer some bare minimum encouragement. “I--” she starts, then freezes. A beat passes, and her reflection looks down at her dispassionately. “I did what I could. We’re here now, and I had to do what I could. I couldn’t lose them both.” Another breath, and Emmet feels the tension rise in her shoulders. “...Right?”

Emmet hugs her now, wrapping his arms around her as her reflection lunges, perfect nails piercing solid ice and grabbing her by the coat collar. He doesn't expect to be able to protect her, but holds her like a promise. He will find her. He will win this. 

She’s already limp in his arms. The hand pulls her inward until her weight and warmth vanishes entirely. Emmet lurches forward in her absence, feeling tears gather in his eyes as he stares at the space she left. 

He doesn't want to do this without Elesa. 

He doesn't know if he can. 

Dawn grabs onto his elbow, saying something that doesn't permeate the panic drowning out sound like sand piling over his eardrums. 

"Sorry," he says, with no idea through the cotton in his head whether he's too loud or too soft. 

" Very sorry. I just--I can't--Let's go." 

Spinning on his heel, he glances over Dawn and Barry once and then points an arm forward, looking for their bare minimum assent. Wide-eyed, they nod, and Emmet stride ahead at a pace that sends the kids and Sneasel scrambling to keep up. He should be better, he should be an adult and offer comfort and leadership and a level- fucking -head. 

He can't. 

Chandelure trills as she keeps up by blinking in and out of corporeality, appearing at his side with each one. He hums back, noncommittal and spiteful. He’ll owe another apology later. 

After a few minutes' march, Emmet distantly aware that he has lost track of the exact seconds again, the tunnel comes to a natural close. The walls curve in on themselves beneath two jutting spikes of stone and ice that frame the last patch of reflective surface so that only his shoulders all but block the surrounding view. Shoes scuff across dust and rock as the kids rush over. 

Emmet places his hand flat against the surface, anticipating and imitating the note on which it chimes as ripples curl out from the round of his gloved fingertips. 

“It’s the end of the line. Where to, Uxie?" 

For a moment, nothing happens, and Emmet wonders whether Uxie is toying with him. Could they have already failed when Ingo got pulled through the wall? Was this pointless? 

Then his figure resolves in the reflection, too bright in the white of his uniform coat. His hat is gone, his hair whipping tendrils in the wind. He's silent. Darkness bleeds into the ice like blood in water, swirling and billowing outward around Emmet's reflection. Thin purple glow illuminates behind him, drenching his reflection's coat in eerie tones. 

His reflection looks like shit. 

Dark circles ring his red-rimmed eyes, and patchy stubble lines his jaw and chin. His uniform jacket is wrinkled and bunched up at the sleeves, the shirt underneath unbuttoned at the wrist and half rolled. His tie is askew. He sneers at Emmet, as if daring him to flinch back. 

He does not. 

His reflection says, "Why didn’t you do anything?”

Bile crawls up Emmet's throat. He doesn't recognize his own voice, hoarse and furious, but it knows him. 

I didn’t know, he wants to say. I couldn’t remember. 

But then he considers the evidence. Something always felt terribly wrong. There was evidence everywhere. Even if he couldn’t bypass Azelf’s void, what did it say about him that he never paused to question the gaps, the dissociation, or the nightmares that he could never remember? 

He hadn’t tried, and just let it eat at him until Ingo found his own way home. 

His reflection waits, scoffing and chewing at the back of his thumbnail. Emmet licks his lips, his mouth and throat dry. “I could not derail,” he croaks, feeling pitiful for it. “I would not let everything we worked for fall apart.”

His reflection blinks back at him, raising an eyebrow. “What we worked for? You didn’t remember. You thought it was what you worked for.” He steps forward and jabs at the wall of ice between them. “Isn’t that selfish?”

"I still lost him, even if I couldn’t remember. I did what I could to keep going. I had to keep going.”

But he didn't, did he? Would he have recognized Ingo’s absence if he let himself stop, even for just a moment? Could he have fought back against Arceus’s will and the spirit’s power to find the truth?

Could he have protected Ingo in the first place? 

His reflection glowers at him, furious tears gathering at the corners of his eyes. Emmet understands. They share the same grief, the same rage, just fixed on different moments across time. They’re the same. 

"Wanting to fix it doesn’t change that it happened. What matters is that we survived. That’s all we could do.”

“What if you’re wrong?” It comes out like something spat to the dirt. 

Emmet understands what compelled the others, now. Every inch of him yearns to scream that he doesn’t know, to reach out and grab this specter of himself by the shoulders and ask him everything. Question after question piles heavy on his tongue and he bites down, hard, to stifle his voice. 

What was he supposed to have done? What consequence caused Arceus to take everything from him? What did he know that Emmet could not, not yet? What if he can’t survive knowing?

Won’t he know soon enough?

So he says, barely believing it himself, “I keep moving forward. We try to recover.”

Apparently it’s enough. The form’s shoulders drop and it starts to dissipate, fracturing into pin lights of blue and purple as the figure recedes back away from the threshold between them. Emmet doesn’t understand why it makes him feel so sad. 

He tears his gaze away. 

He lowers, gently, to his knees. 

Dawn says, voice trembling and hands hesitating with light touches over his shoulder, “Are you okay, Emmet?”

"I--I am fine," he says, wondering what’s come over him. He needs to stand up. He needs to lead them out and find the others. He needs to make sure they finish this, and remember. 

He does not move. 

A thought occurs, bitter and sharp. "What if I'm the reason we don't remember?" 

Barry and Dawn protest in tandem. Emmet elaborates. “I didn’t recognize that person. Not at first. I’ve never been that angry. I’m…I’m not a cruel person, I don’t think. Didn’t think. But could I have been? If I remembered? And then could my actions be the consequence that Arceus wanted to avoid?”

Barry, this time, says, "You can't blame yourself for what Arceus did. That's dumb."

It's the same conversation as with Ingo, out in the snow. Not your fault. Never your fault. Nobody blames you. 

Did it feel as hollow to Ingo as it does to him now? 

No one says anything more. Hands fall onto his shoulders and drag him forward with unexpected force into a tight, desperate embrace. Enough of him still wants to put up some illusion of resolve, a farce of acceptance, that he holds back tears until he feels Dawn shake against him, crying herself. So he cries with her, both of them better able to cry for each other than for themselves. 

Ingo would hold him like this, as kids. They would cry, snotty and disgusting, into each other's shirts until whatever furious grief that overtook them had passed. 

Emmet was always the crier of the two, at least where others could see, but Ingo rarely held it together when Emmet actually wept. He was too compassionate, too good, to leave him to cry alone.  

What? 

"Hey, guys, the ice is melting." 

Emmet drags up his head to find that Barry is right. The walls trickle in rapid rivulets, gathering in puddles around them. Instinct drives him to pull himself and Dawn up and out of the water, but his knees are locked to the floor.

He's caught on a thought, unbidden, of how he and Ingo were. The memory comes as easy breathing. 

How could he forget? They were inseparable, together from the beginning, following one another from primary school to their League Challenge to university. They rebuilt the subway together, more than often with their own hands, and brought it to life with the Battle Circuits.

Wait.

Ice melts like rain against a windowpane, drops coalescing one into another into channels that race to the floor. Beside him, Barry gasps. Dawn pulls back as Barry shouts something that Emmet does not hear.

Ingo was loud, always so loud and all the better for it, because he could speak up when Emmet could not. They were what the other wasn't. At least, those were the parts they played. Perfect mirror images, easily in tandem, an answer to the other's question. It was an easy script to follow. 

Ingo had been soft-spoken once, when they were very young. And Emmet had shouted and laughed, demanding the spotlight and drawing attention away from Ingo. Emmet wouldn't say he mellowed with age, but both of them grew more secure as adults, better for the other at their side. 

Barry is chattering beside him, Dawn's weight drawing away. Emmet barely notices. 

He is five and they are learning to read with wide board books depicting steam engines and railcars. He is seven and Ingo comes home, hours late for dinner, carrying a little Litwick that he claims is his new best friend, much to Emmet's dismay. He is twelve and they're setting off, together, Litwick and Tynamo in tow, an afternoon away from their first real battle as trainers. 

Emmet pitches forward, shoving his head between his knees. Water pools around his hands and soaks through the knees of his trousers, cold biting where it sops to his skin. He does not care. 

He is thirteen and they are mourning, their uncle signing adoption papers in the office with the door shut as Emmet has his first panic attack. He is sixteen and he finally won the Legend Badge, and Ingo is waiting in the entryway to pick him up and swing him in circles until Emmet threatens to hurl. He is eighteen and Ingo is trying not to laugh as he cradles the toilet, regretting every awful alcoholic concoction that Elesa promised would be fine and definitely fun. 

He is twenty-one and they are in Depot Agent greens, learning to salute in perfect time with not a hair out of place. He is twenty-three and too young to be a master of anything, but surely he can do it with Ingo by his side. He is twenty-five and opening the Multi Circuit with Elesa and Skyla as their first promotional challengers, with Chandelure and Eelektross are in perfect sync. 

He is twenty-seven and Ingo is gone. 

He is twenty-seven and Ingo disappears off Platform 4 with his Pokemon left behind. The security footage shows him walking into the Signal Room and minutes later Excadrill, Haxorus and Chandelure burst out, scaring the passengers and unable to be soothed until Emmet rushes onto the platform with his heart in his throat. 

He is twenty-seven and the detective in charge suggests that Ingo could be dead. Emmet lashes out and is summarily put on mandatory leave. 

He is twenty-seven and he sits in his uncle's library with a plan. He hunts down the Xtransceiver of an old friend, a former Champion, and hides on a slip of paper it in the book that gave him the idea. 

He is twenty-seven when he forgets. A moment between blinks, and half of his world is purged from his memory and he carries on without knowing with only the ache of something missing buried deep underneath. It's killing him, slowly, until he is thirty-two and Elesa intervenes. 

Oh.

The pool of water laps at the skin between his sleeve and glove, soaking into the soft fabric that gathers close to his wrist. 

Emmet is still crying.

He doesn't know if he is able to stop. 

Because he remembers . All of it. Every moment, every muscle memory instinct to be one of a pair, a two-car train, and with it he understands exactly who he is and what he lost. 

He drags up his hands to gather, clumsy, into his hair as he tries not to scream. This is unsuccessful. Head still bowed between his legs, he releases every minute of missed anguish, lost grief, and unknowable pain from his lungs in a single, awful howl. 

For four years, five months, twenty-one days, twelve hours and thirteen minutes, Ingo had been lost. In Sinnoh, centuries out of reach, where Emmet would have followed had Arceus left his memories untouched. Instead, he is here. Here where Ingo is alive and remembers him, too. 

His voice gives way to a hoarse gasp that doubles as a sob. 

He hears a voice. "Emmet?" 

"Ingo," he rasps. 

Emmet tears his head up, ignoring the spots of dark that curl around his vision. The ice has melted away, leaving only miniature glaciers in the sea of standing water that he recognizes as Lake Acuity’s cavern array. Across the pool is Ingo, his brother, his twin, his partner and rival, half-horizontal, up on one arm in the water. Looking for him. 

Emmet is on his feet at once. His legs carry him without thinking, long running strides across meters in a second until he's near enough to fall back to his knees and skid the rest of the distance. With Ingo hoisted up on his right hand, the gap between arm and torso is an opening that Emmet collides into, throwing one arm around his back and the other through and under, squeezing with all the strength left in him. 

Ingo is solid and real in his arms. Ingo is here , breathing and immediately launching into soothing words that Emmet cannot make out over his heartbeat thudding in his ears. He pulls Ingo closer, and Ingo shifts up and onto his knees with the wordless direction, wrapping his arms around Emmet's heaving back. 

Pressing his face into his shoulder, Emmet sobs into Ingo's sweater. He has years of tears to cry, but only can manage a minute before pulling back, desperate to look at his brother again. His tear-streamed face meets Ingo's mirrored, quiet weeping. Beneath tears, Ingo smiles. 

Ingo smiles now. So often. For Emmet, for Dawn and the kids and Elesa, for his Pokemon and Sneasel. He is full of soft smiles that he never had before Hisui. 

Emmet cannot find words. He ghosts his hands over his brother's face, feeling that it’s real, before interlacing them behind his neck. Scooting forward on his knees, he lowers his forehead against Ingo's, sobbing again as Ingo presses his forehead back firm on his and gathers his fists in Emmet's coat. 

"Gone," Emmet croaks. "You were gone. I couldn't find you. And then I lost you again." 

"I know. I know. But I found my way back to you." He smiles broader, and another well of tears spill. "I am home."

That does it. Emmet just wails, burying his head into Ingo's shoulder again and weeping there until the pain can subside. Ingo is past trying to soothe him, and only whispers into the crown of his head, breath wispy in his hair, “I love you, Emmet. I missed you.”

Arms gather around them, Elesa’s voice struggling for words until she asks, “Ingo?” Emmet can feel Ingo’s cheek brush against his as he nods, and Elesa hand grips his shoulder as her hold around them tightens, her own sobs joining his. Soon Iris nestles between the three of them, Ingo all but smothered, and he’s caught between laughter and tears that Emmet can feel rumble in his chest where he listens to his heartbeat. 

The cold water seeps through their clothes. They’ll need to make it to Snowpoint before nightfall. Soon, the moment will end and they will reckon with everything yet to come. But, for now, Emmet counts the steady rhythm of his brother's heart as his little family gathers close, together and whole. 

Home, Ingo had said. They found home. 

Chapter Text

When Iris starts to shiver amidst the huddled mess of them, Ingo knows it's time to move on. He doesn't know how long has passed since he came to, and the thin daylight that filters in from the far-off entrance does little to enlighten him, cut through as it is with Chandelure’s vibrant, joyful flames hovering just above. Nevertheless, Ingo is certain he could stay forever, his family gathered in his arms, heedless of the cold. Or, at least, he could ignore it, even as the standing water soaks through his trousers and sops, frigid, to his skin. What difference does the cold make when they remember him? When all the longing and hope and fear resolved into the simple truth of being known, and being loved?

But, Iris is shivering even as she sniffles and wraps herself tighter around his arm, and Emmet notices, too. Ingo can feel rather than see the long, rallying breath his brother takes just before he draws himself away from Ingo's chest, laying a steadying hand on Elesa’s back as he drops from his heels back onto his knees to face them. Emmet's bloodshot, glassy eyes meet his, and then slide to Iris huddled beside him. He says, voice hoarse, "We shouldn't stay here."

Ingo nods, his own voice failing as he reckons with there being something beyond this moment. The aftermath unfolds, inscrutable, before him.  

Focused as they were on restoring their place in the world, it seems surreal, now, to exist as part of it. 

Their world. Their task. 

Dawn. 

Heart jumping into his throat, he casts a startled, sweeping glance across the cavern to find Dawn with Barry and Lucas huddled in the adjacent pool. Chandelure, floating between the two groups, trills and bobs mid-air, evidently noticing his distress and attempting reassurance. Dawn peaks up at him, all tear tracks and snot, and she musters up an unsteady smile, brow upturned in disbelief. With a breathy laugh, she buries her head again into the notch between the boys’ shoulders, and Ingo’s heart rate begins, slowly, to settle. 

Between waking up and parsing from Emmet’s desperate grief that he had been remembered, Ingo had been so lost in the relief and overwhelm to even notice the kids mere paces away. Even now, ostensibly present again, his senses feel dulled like a limb succumbing to the cold. He finds himself semi-disembodied, a machine on autopilot with a button stuck in the recess. 

Ah. I must be exhausted. 

“Mister Emmet is right,” Lucas mumbles, and Dawn leans back and runs her forearm across her face, freeing Barry to stand up. One at a time, he hauls Lucas and then Dawn to their feet, his hands hovering nervously over Dawn’s shoulders as she falters on wobbly legs. Steadied, she leans heavily into Lucas and wraps her hand around Barry’s wrist. She sighs then, the force of it visible in her back slumping forward, and takes a moment more before she turns around. 

Closer to Chandelure, purple light emphasizes the fatigue that wears on her features. But when she smiles at him again, it reaches her eyes. 

"It's not far to Snowpoint," she says, glancing towards the cavern entrance that, Ingo realizes, had at some point re-emerged from behind the sheer rock wall that had obscured it during the trial. The thought gives Ingo a twist of vertigo, finding himself unable to reconcile Acuity’s cave with the distorted tunnels of ice Uxie transported them to. 

"But it's too cold for wet clothes. We should dry off first," Dawn continues, blindly reaching for a pokeball on her belt and releasing Rapidash on the dry earth back towards the exit. 

He brays and settles, legs folding beneath him, flames inviting as they cast the cavern in warm orange light. A spot of dark bounds from the edge of the standing water right to Rapidash's flank, red eyes flashing, catching the firelight. Sneasel, who evidently had the sense that they lacked and kept out of the water, chatters at them from where it’s warm and dry, flapping her claw in a clear bid for them to hurry up to her side. Ingo chuckles, relieved and fond. 

Iris finally relaxes her hold around Ingo's arm, peering up at him and then around his shoulder to Dawn. She sniffles again as she sits back on her heels, setting her expression into a pouty frown that Ingo knows is an attempt to recover her composure. Failing that, she asks, "We won’t stay long, right?" She tries, and fails, to subdue her chattering teeth as she speaks. "This being Uxie's cave and all." 

"Uxie can--" 

The water churns, sloshing with movement, when Emmet interrupts Dawn with a gasp. "Wait," he breathes, barely louder than the hiss of nylon as his gloved hands brush, tentative, along Ingo’s shoulders before one lands flat on his cheek to guide his face forward. Ingo marvels, distantly, at the easy intimacy in the gesture as his brother's searching eyes trace his features, expression twisting with concern. 

"Are you hurt? I lost track--I didn't think…" He trails off as he shifts to Iris and then Elesa, hand retreating to mimic the gesture, wiping a stray tear from Iris's cheekbone and then smoothing Elesa's hair. "Uxie's trial. You were pulled through." He tosses an anxious glance over his shoulder and Lucas cringes at the sudden attention. "You're okay?" 

"Not hurt," Elesa says first, pushing up off her hip and taking hold of Emmet’s forearms. Ingo hadn’t noticed the gentle pressure of her arm around his back until it lifts away, and his next breath drags on the inhale, shallow in his lungs. 

"Just a bit shaken. It wasn't real…right? Nothing actually pulled me, I just fainted. Or fell asleep. And then I was back here, and you were yelling and I started to remember --" Her voice breaks then, catching on a tinny, incredulous laugh just on the edge of hysterical.  

Emmet leans into her hands as she folds in on herself, heads resting together. Ingo pulls himself closer to where they sit, the past days’ doubts and reservations forgotten, and throws his arms around their shoulders, dragging them close again. The cold water still bites his skin through drenched fabric, and nearer now with his eyes clear of tears Ingo can see the blue-tinged pallor underneath the swollen, over-cried red of their faces. 

Every instinct tells him to move, to get them to the warmth and to leave this cave, and with it the Lake Spirits' trials, behind. But his knees are anchored to the earth, a small voice within him insisting that until they are ready, he will not leave them again. 

He's aware that it's an absurd conclusion, but he's stuck on it all the same. 

"Okay," Emmet says, collapsing inward with the heft of a held breath finally exhaled. "Okay. Good. And everybody else?"

Iris makes a small sound of agreement as Lucas, visible just over Elesa's and Emmet's bowed shoulders, nods readily. Leaving Ingo to whisper, "We are alright, Emmet. Everyone is safe, you did well. You can rest now. Dawn and I know the route from here." 

The leery sidelong glance Emmet gives him is exactly what Ingo expects at the suggestion, and to be able to anticipate his brother’s reflexive response is still enough to leave Ingo a little light-headed. He knows Emmet, in more than impulse and half-memory. This is his brother, his twin, and he’s not so changed that he hands over responsibility without a thought. But even that aches, knowing now the weight of two that Emmet bore on his shoulders alone for years now. There’s a conversation to be had there, passing unsaid between narrowed eyes and the stern set of Ingo’s frown, conceding for now the things left to say. There are so many conversations they should have--they can have--but this is not the time. Not yet. 

For now, Emmet does not protest, and after a moment longer Elesa draws herself away, turning to level Ingo with a long look that is no less exacting for the heaviness in her eyes. "We all need to rest, Ingo. You, too. Okay?" 

He nods. “Of course.” He’d promise her anything, just to hear in her voice that she remembers him.  

Satisfied, she stands, steadying herself with a light hand on Ingo's shoulder. Turning to Iris, she announces, "Dawn's right. Let's get warm so we can get to Snowpoint. I'd do anything not to camp again tonight." The lightness in her tone rings forced, and her hand lingers on his shoulder for a touch too long before she pulls away. 

Iris follows, the water sloshing as she kicks up to her feet, words bright as she concurs with the sentiment. He admires their ability to forge ahead with chosen levity, even with tear tracks staining their cheeks. They join the kids where Rapidash sits, Iris leaning against his flank beside Lucas and Elesa taking his head in her lap to stroke as she would Zebstrika. This leaves Ingo to wait with Emmet as he hesitates, staring at the water’s opaque surface. 

"Emmet?" Ingo asks, pitched as low as he can manage and still his brother flinches, tension building again in the slope of his shoulders and the rigid lines of his arms. The obvious question-- are you alright --seems abruptly inane, answered easily by the quiet agony of it all that he hasn't the strength to reckon with here in the cold dark. He hadn’t on the route here, either. There’s a temptation to leave it to fester, but Ingo has had years enough of waiting for neglected wounds to heal. 

"I am fine," Emmet says before Ingo can mentally reroute. He drags himself up, wincing, and extends a hand towards Ingo. When their eyes meet again he smiles, soft and a little unsteady, and says, "I won't ask you not to worry. I am adjusting to new tracks--the correct tracks--and it is a lot, all at once. But I am okay. I promise."

Ingo takes his hand, and sets aside all the wants within him. The want to know, to understand Emmet’s memories so that he can compare it to the disjointed islands of history that Ingo calls remembering, can wait. It will wait. Just as the want to understand the vestigial hurts that bore bruises underneath his brother's eyes and lurk in the quiet of his voice must wait.

The impulse is there, contextualized and validated by their memories restored, to insist on intervening. It had been there from the first moment in the Coronet foothills, his brother's name called out from the woods an electric current of recognition, and with it responsibility. Their first reunion, his slack body too light on Ingo's back with Elesa's fear-turned-hostility and Drayden's defensive ire, unstuck an instinct that predicates memory. Before he knew Emmet, Ingo knew to take care of him. 

Now he knows Emmet. And Emmet knows him. But where Ingo's anamnesis had the excruciating luxury of being gradual, Emmet had remembered all at once and came to screaming. 

The urge to hold Emmet close and apologize, needlessly and no less endlessly, burns like the tears that threaten at the corners of his eyes. How is it possible to be so emotionally exhausted and yet so unable to stifle the emotions exhausting him? 

It's all too much. So when Emmet helps Ingo to his feet, Ingo lets inertia carry him into another, gentler hug, his overwhelm easing as his brother relaxes into him. Even if only for a moment, it's the relief Ingo can offer. So he will, readily, easily, for as long as he's needed. 

But he offers no apologies, knowing they're unwanted. Another conversation for another moment, when their frayed, ragged edges have waned into something better suited for mending. 

Instead of I'm sorry, Ingo says, "I understand." 

Emmet hums a quiet acknowledgement, landing his forehead on Ingo's shoulder. They stay for a lingering moment. Both hold onto each other too tight because that's the closest they have to words to convey it all. A last delay, self-indulgent as it is, before they finally part and Emmet leads him by the hand with played-up haste to Rapidash's gentle heat. 

The kids speak in low, urgent tones about what Lucas and Iris saw in the ice when Ingo sits. While Lucas explains that his reflection accused him of cowardice or, worse, indifference, Ingo lays his gloves with the collected winter-wear and brings his hands up, flat, to face the careful flames. 

Sneasel wastes no time climbing into his lap. Careful not to disturb her steadily purring engine, he sheds his tunic and lays it damp-side-up in front of him. His undershirt is less dry than he would have hoped, no doubt on account of waking up half-submerged. The comparison with Emmet and Elesa emerging from Valor arises, unbidden and unwelcome, and Ingo sits uneasy in the thought that he spent yet another trial rendered useless.

Chandelure prods at his back, no doubt sensing his unease. She trills, a spot of warmth between his shoulder blades for a beat before she floats to Emmet and nudges him until he unfolds his arms to make room for her against his chest. Ingo wonders if Emmet, too, can detect the change. Chandelure was always theirs, but her attachment to Emmet now was something Ingo now recognizes as new.  

He wonders what it was like, for Chandelure and their Pokemon, to remember when no one else could. Had they understood, then, what had happened? Can they tell now what had been restored? 

Chandelure seems to, at the least. 

Emmet, at the end of whispered reassurances, insists that she should rest. After a muted half-protest, she concedes, dematerializing of her own accord to return to her pokeball. Sneasel purrs away in his lap, and Ingo's fatigued mind cannot quite latch onto the conversation, however concerned he is with what occurred after he fell. 

“I mean,” murmurs Lucas. “It wasn’t wrong. We studied Giratina and the Lake Spirits for months. And they knew you, Dawn, from their past. I wish--I don’t know. I can’t tell if I feel so guilty because of the trial, or if I was going to feel this way anyway.” 

Iris folds her arms around her knees, hiding behind the crook of her elbow. “I didn’t need Uxie to tell me that I wish I could have done something. Anything. I just needed to remember to know that.”

“Wasn’t that the point?” Dawn asks, pulling a loose strand of hair between her thumb and forefinger, talking at the ground. “You got caught in the feedback loop of all the guilt. Which you shouldn’t feel, by the way. None of you. But it’s easy to when you remember everything.”

Lulled by the warmth, Ingo lets his heavy eyes fall closed. Perhaps selfishly, he feels little urgency to uncover the exact intentions behind the trial. So he lets the discussion fade to ambient noise. 

That they have the energy to puzzle it out is a comfort. Dawn and Barry especially, who he gathered had succeeded against their reflections with Emmet and had faced the trial in its entirety. For Ingo’s part, having failed first, it’s a wonder he’s so tired. Psychically imposed or otherwise, a nap wasn’t a particularly strenuous task. 

“Did we forget who we were meant to be?” 

Ingo winces, and wonders how he was meant to answer. Dread hums restless beneath the surface of all his relief, spurred by the fear that this entire nightmare had been his doing. It will haunt him, he’s certain, if he allows it. Which, if Dawn is to be believed (and she usually is), was the idea that Uxie meant to get across. Provided one assumes it hadn’t intended to be cruel.  

"What about you, Ingo?" Barry asks, quite loud, and his name startles Ingo from his hazy half-thoughts. When he opens his eyes, Dawn is whirling on Barry to slap a hand over his mouth, but he speaks faster than she moves. "Do you remember everything now or are you the same as Dawn?" 

He feels Emmet's attention shift his way. Elesa stills her hand as it strokes Rapidash’s muzzle, not watching but plainly listening. 

"No," Ingo answers, before the scrutiny can derail him. "The memory episodes ceased this morning, and did not return when I woke up after the trial. However, I remember enough, I think, to trust in Arceus's word that what is left will return in time."

Barry wrinkles his nose at that. Dawn elbows him and says, "That's because the trials were never about our memories. Like I said, Barry, this was only ever about fixing you guys. And everybody else, I guess. Not Ingo and me." 

"You were the one who thought it was Uxie causing the flashbacks out in the snow," counters Lucas, only shrinking a smidge when Dawn levels him with a glare. 

"I still do. I just… Don't think that was the trial." The boys gape at her, obviously incredulous. She looks at them each in turn and then deflates. What was left of the certainty in her bearing drains to vulnerability, lip caught between her teeth. "I think that was Uxie being kind."

Silence falls between them, the cavern quiet except for the rumble of Sneasel’s purrs and the dull echoes of condensation dropping into the water. Ingo thinks of the long trek here, and of his reflection in the caverns of ice. He thinks of the second before everything fell away to darkness, of the sudden shock of cold. He thinks of waking up alone, and of Emmet clutching to him on the tide of four years of grief condensed into a single moment. 

"You were in pain," Emmet says, likely the only one among them able to keep his voice so carefully neutral. "That was a kindness?"

"Yeah. But I got to remember. Even if it's not everything, I know who I am now. I know Barry and Lucas, and Professor Rowan and Cynthia. I know what my mom’s voice sounds like, and what it’s like when she hugs me. And that I met you, Emmet. I met you and Iris and Ingo, and I'm here now because I recognized him in Hisui and he felt like home . So what if it hurt? What does that matter?"

Elesa slides from her knees onto her hip, fabric shuffling against dust and grit, and tilts her head as she looks at Dawn. Ingo expects Dawn is on the receiving end of the same exacting attention Elesa pinned him under earlier. "Of course it matters, Dawn. Your amnesia wasn't an accident. It happened because something powerful thought it could use you and Ingo without consequences. I can't believe there's no way to help you remember that doesn't hurt you." 

"Sure, fine," Dawn says, a raw edge to her tone accentuated by a flippant shrug, her head turning down and away from Elesa's scrutiny. "But unless Arceus is offering, I have to be okay with what I've got. What else can I do?" 

With another glance between Barry and Lucas, both of them clearly calculating whether to go to her or give her space, Dawn sighs. "I know it's not what you think I deserve. I don't get to defeat the bad guys and make it all go away. But all I wanted was for you to remember me. And I got that. We won, even if you think we shouldn't have been fighting in the first place. We won ."

They had. Their victory holds true in the shine in Lucas's eyes when he looks at her, in how Barry pulls her into him in a rushed, desperate hug. They won and now their world remembers them. They belonged again. 

Though he lost track of the exact details of their conversation, Ingo understands the impetus well enough. There was no destination set for them now, beyond returning to their home stations. Their trajectory wrought by Arceus had reached its terminus. Here in the after, it's easy to wonder. Their circular questions strive for a reason that could make sense of, or better yet justify, what had happened. Yet they had not arrived at a cause that could convince them that it was fair. And so Dawn asks--insists--that they reckon with the reasons not mattering more than the end. 

What else can they do? 

Dawn says, muffled by Barry’s coat, "I just want to go home."

They can move forward. Segment the before and after into time-tight compartments, and find healing in inertia. 

Lucas says, "We just want you to be okay."

It occurs to Ingo, viscerally, that he know longer knows Dawn best. This hadn't been a notion he consciously held, feeling no entitlement to her interiority and only hoping to be of some small comfort when he could. But the thought catches him off guard, all the same. He watches the three of them, who have known Dawn since she was small, since before she was a Champion and a hero, learn the shape of the difference a year has made. 

There's little left to be said, after that, and Dawn collapses into Barry's chest with a frustrated noise. The tension eases, regardless of the stewing sense of irresolution, and Ingo busies himself with Sneasel curled up against him and his tunic drying still on the ground. Rapidash, endlessly patient, whinnies as Elesa coaxes him to lift her head from her lap, scooting on her knees towards Ingo to grab his hand again in hers. When Iris, words carefully chosen, asks about the route to Snowpoint, Ingo obliges, if only to steer the conversation towards more navigable tracks. 

In time, clothes dried and warm against his skin as Ingo prepares to step back out into the snow, they move on. The afternoon beyond the cavern is bright, with blue skies boundless overhead, and Lake Acuity stands still and clear, more like glass than water. As Ingo, last to leave, passes the threshold, a voice returns, soft as a whisper and effortlessly clear in his mind.  

"Goodbye, travelers. May the knowledge restored find you the answers you seek." 

The words settle like a fallen stone on ice, nestling into the fissure it's made, a touch away from shattering. 

Snowpoint City rests in the hollow where the Pearl Settlement once stood, visible on the horizon from the ridge that slopes southeast towards the lakefront trail. The Temple looms from the adjacent mountaintop, no less ancient in the centuries since Ingo last saw it. That it stands unchanged is disconcerting, a few hundred years seeming infinitesimal in its limestone architecture. So little in Sinnoh has been unchanged, beyond perhaps Mount Coronet. To see it on the horizon now, as if the gulf of time had not swallowed Hisui whole, leaves him dizzy. 

The path between Lake Acuity and the Temple had long been overgrown, forcing them to take the regulated route. The Temple sinks out of view as they descend, with it the snow-dusted roofs interspersed below it. Dawn leads, quick steps carving a path from ledge to ledge until she finds level ground and an approximation of a trail winding through the lingering edges of the woods to the north and south.

Sneasel bounds ahead to join her, a blur of lilac over white, while Ingo guides Elesa, then Iris, down the last ledges. Emmet, more lucid now that they've left Acuity’s cave, carefully mimics Dawn's descent, one foot at a time in the imprint of her soles in the snow. He grins at Elesa and Ingo from the path, hand laid perpendicular to his face as if to project a shout, before he startles. The offending hand curls and he twists his wrist to look at his Xtransceiver, and Ingo focuses his attention on Iris's hand in his, following close. 

When they join the others, it's Iris's turn to startle, her own Xtransceiver flashing to life where it's visible at the edge of her coat sleeve. 

"We have signal again," Emmet says by way of explanation as Iris bunches up her sleeve to better see the screen. 

The vibrating continues, followed by an array of different chimes and beeps sounding around the group. Ingo, deviceless, feels suddenly bereft, but has little time to sulk before Iris hauls him close. She drags her finger, glove half-discarded, across the glass and yanks open the second screen in time for Drayden to appear on camera, visibly disheveled. 

Face right up to his camera, he blinks at them before he pulls away and straightens his collar, back flat against his enormous office chair. His glance slides between the two of them, and the hand at his tie closes into a clenched fist. "Iris," he starts, voice thick. A rough swallow and a shallow breath, and he says, " Ingo ."

"Hi, Dad." Iris beams, looping her free arm around Ingo's and tilting her head in his direction. "Sorry about the wait. Terrible service up in the middle of frozen nowhere. Happy to see us?" 

He bows his head, concealing his fractured composure before his stony-face facade falls. "Ingo," he says again, the name catching in between syllables, forcing him to clear his throat and start again. His hovering hand drops to the desk, and he says, "I apologize. I am the one who called and yet, seeing you, I'm at a loss for what to say. And, if I recall how this works, you only know me as the man who yelled at--" 

"I remember you," Ingo interrupts, surprised at his own haste. Anything to disrupt that terrible train of thought. "You are my uncle. You adopted Emmet and me when our parents passed, and before that you taught us how to battle. You helped me raise the Axew that is now my dear Haxorus, and you keep a clipping of the news story announcing the Battle Subway's grand opening in a frame on your desk. I kept the Legend Badge you gave me in my wallet. I have missed you dearly, even when I did not know how to."

"Ah," Uncle Drayden says, the sound like air shunted out of his lungs. He meets Ingo’s eyes, and for a moment his face entirely crumples, turned brows digging deeper the lines on his forehead. They wait, and Iris's lip begins to wobble again as she watches her father's last defenses fall away. 

He recovers in an instant that feels an eternity and pitches forwards, landing heavy on steepled hands, as if holding back tears sapped what strength was left in him. "Earned it. I did not give you my badge, you earned it," He says, voice stern before it wavers on the hard t , like a stutter. Performative paternalism dropped, he earnestly continues, "Dragons, Ingo, you're alive. You're safe . I searched for you. I searched and begged to find you, and you were taken from us again because we searched. Yet when you found us, I treated you like you were nothing to me." 

"It was not your fault," Ingo says, the reassurance familiar by now. He wishes their inagency, how this was done to them and not by them, mattered. He knows too well that it does not. 

"I was wrong. You are everything to me. You, your brother and Iris." He halts and pulls himself up and back--forced posture Ingo knows well--eyes blinking wide then narrowing. "Emmet. He's not there? Is he--" 

It is Emmet's turn to interrupt their uncle, stepping into the frame behind Iris, resting his chin on the crown of her head. "I am Emmet. I am fine. We are almost to Snowpoint. It is late in Unova. This conversation should wait until you get some sleep." 

"Emmet, you hypocrite." Iris's recorded reflection glares up at him. "That's not fair. He just remembered, and he's not here to see us and Ingo for himself."

But their uncle concedes. "He's right. I am the one who left for Unova, and I need to be able to manage the fallout come morning. That was the agreement, after all. I am glad I got to speak to you nonetheless. Sleep or not, I will rest easier knowing you're safe and well. All of you."

Yanking Ingo closer by his hooked arm, Iris smiles wide, all teeth and scrunched up, if teary, eyes. "We did it, Dad." 

Emmet adds, quiet but sure, "Don't worry about us."

Momentarily at a loss with words caught in his throat, Ingo watches, mute, as Iris moves to hang up. But he finds his voice again, and says, "We will see you soon."

The call ends. Ingo wishes for home in a way he could never quite endure, before Uxie. Now he can look at the longing straight in the eyes and hold it together, knowing that home wishes for him in return.  

"Why the rush, Emmet?" Iris says, spinning on him with a mock punch to his arm. "Dad's the reason we were here in the first place. You can at least be nice, if you're not gonna be grateful." 

Emmet jerks his head towards the others, gathered a few paces ahead around Barry, who is stooped over his phone with his cheek pulled tight between his teeth. Dawn, one arm thrown around his back, stares over her own shoulder towards the route ahead, pulling away from him and tilting her head up towards the sky at the moment Ingo turns to look. 

"It sounded like Barry was losing the argument," Emmet explains. "Ingo will want to be there for Dawn when her people arrive."

Though he smiles, it's a tight thing. Drawn thin with a visible knot along his jawline, his teeth-clenched falsehood is not fooling Ingo. And though he's ready to take his place beside Dawn on Emmet's word, Ingo hesitates. 

It's this conversation again. In the daylight, Emmet's cold-chapped face and forward momentum isn't enough to mask his glassy stare and the way he winces when he believes no one is looking. It's the same question, the one that Ingo must wear too clearly in his expression given Emmet's constant reassurances. I am fine, I am fine, I promise. 

How unfair it is that they remembered each other out here, where the wilderness and the cold demands they move on and move forward. Their duty to the kids, to Elesa, and to one another allows them no time to process, not yet. 

So Ingo swallows his voice--for now, only for now--and shifts tracks towards Dawn, a parting hand pressed on Emmet's shoulder in another wordless acknowledgement. Elesa and Lucas busy themselves with Barry, whose frustrated silence has resolved into a breathless rant, Ingo only able to catch the words "never listens" and an impressive range of expletives. 

Dawn spares him a fleeting, fragile glance when he steps up beside her, before her stare flits back to the tree-shawled horizon. Her chest expands and contracts, visible despite the layers, with short, heaving breaths as a spot of color disrupts the swathe of cloudless blue, and she snatches his hand in hers. 

"It will be alright, Dawn." 

"I know," she breathes. "Remember the roof? After Lake Valor? You said ‘change isn't the end of the line’."

Ingo chuckles, squeezing her hand. "I said a number of things. I am glad something stayed with you." 

She laughs, and it's like she'd laugh over dinner in the Highlands and after a long battle at the Training Grounds. The surge of adoration that follows has a history now, in Emmet's smile, Elesa's teasing and Iris's infectious energy. But, this version of that fondness that belongs to Dawn alone. 

The figure in the sky grows nearer, orange with teal wings beating the air with visible force. It starts a descent, wings folding closer to dive downward towards them, carrying the shape of a person on its back. 

Dawn says, "I was so, so stuck on having changed, that I didn't really consider what changes from here. When I couldn't remember myself, all I could think about was that there was no going back. But I didn't want to go back, not really. Except now I'm wondering if I really want to move forward, either. Is that awful of me?" 

It's a Dragonite, his mind supplies, as it sinks towards the clearing in front of them, a rush of wind carrying off the beat of its wings. There are two people on its back, a man and a young woman, neither of which he recognizes. The man's wild blond hair is context enough, however. Ingo recalls the phone calls Barry spent days avoiding, and the one he took at Valor that appeared to accomplish little more than delaying the inevitable. The stormy look on the man's face suggests the time for delays has passed. 

"It is alright to be overwhelmed," Ingo says, and her grip on his hand is enough to sting, their gloves notwithstanding. "You have nothing to be ashamed of."

"I--" 

" Dawn !" The man--Barry's father-- shouts as he dismounts Dragonite the moment before it touches the ground, the snow crackling as he lands ankle-deep in the drift. Heedless and haphazard, he plows forward towards them, scanning the group with sharp eyes. A flit of surprise crosses his face,  but whatever it is goes unsaid as he reaches Dawn and lands his hands, solid, on her shoulders, jarring her.

"Dawn. Dawn. Kiddo." He pulls back a hand to scrub it over his face. Behind them, the snow crunches and shifts as others approach, and Ingo releases Dawn's hand to step slightly aside, making way for Barry and Lucas. "Where have you been? What Cynthia said--all that nonsense about the Lake Pokemon and intervention--What happened? Are you alright?" 

The young woman, perhaps a little older than Dawn with dark hair pulled into braids, dismounts the Dragonite and approaches. Up closer, something about her rings familiar, but Ingo cannot place it. 

Dawn replies, "Hi, Mister Palmer. Yes, I'm okay. Everything else is, um, a lot to explain. Short version is whatever Cynthia told you is right, but we fixed it?" 

Barry, less diplomatic, slides his arm around Dawn's and says, "A god kidnapped Dawn and made us forget so that we didn't find it and force it to give her back." He hums, tilting his head up towards the sky and pointedly ignoring the incredulity through horror that crosses his father's expression, and adds, "If you ignore Ingo, that is, which is technically the same thing, but makes you wonder whether Arceus would have even been able to get Dawn if Emmet and Elesa had been able to get to it first, after it took Ingo." 

Unhelpfully, Elesa laughs behind them, and Ingo swings his head around just in time for her to stifle it with her fist. She, and Emmet with Sneasel stuffed in his arms staring daggers at Dragonite, approach to where they all now gather. Again, Palmer glances across each of them, from his son to Ingo, down to Iris with evident recognition, and then back to Dawn. His mouth opens once, then closes, and he draws his second hand back and joins both over his mouth, exhaling into them. 

"I said it's a lot," Dawn mutters, with a childish tone that he's unused to from her. It reminds him of Iris with their uncle, blowing out her cheek when she's sulking, muttering about how unfair he’s been. 

"And," starts the unfamiliar woman with forced-cheer, stepping up next to Palmer. Dawn freezes, shoulders pulling up to her ears, when she notices her. But the woman continues, and, slowly, Dawn relaxes her guard. "We aren't going to discuss it here! I'm on strict orders from Miss Cynthia to ensure you all get to Snowpoint without issue, and my number-one job is to make sure you, Mister Palmer, aren't an issue." 

Palmer's hands drop, and he gapes at her. "An issue? Candice, come on. My son runs off with zero word and suddenly we can see a little girl in pictures of him that we've never seen before. Now it turns out that she’s my neighbor's kid, and the Champion no less, and she has been missing for a year and we all forgot! Like nothing--" He pauses, catches his breath, staring wildly between them until, as quickly as he started, he appears to lose steam. 

"Right. You're right," he amends, bowing his head. He holds out his arms, wide in invitation. "Just, c'mere kids." A pause again, this time with a chuckle. " Yes, you too, Lucas. And then let's get Dawn to her mom, okay?" 

Without further delay, Dawn, Lucas and Barry pile into his waiting arms. Ingo’s nerves settle, the defensive instinct he can’t quite shake fading back to an undercurrent. He understands this man as less the voice arguing on the other end of Barry's phone, and more just Barry but older, impatient and intensely caring. 

The woman, Candice, breaks from them and trudges to where Ingo stands. "You're the Subway Master, right? The, um, missing one?" She stumbles, flushing, and pivots to where the rest stand. "And you all are the other Subway Master, Gym Leader Elesa, and Champion Iris! Sorry for all this, we just couldn't get Mister Palmer to stay put and figured this would be a compromise. Dads, you know? I'm Candice, by the way, and I'm here to make sure nobody's injured or otherwise needs help making it the rest of the way."

Emmet is the fastest to take her extended hand, shifting Sneasel into one arm and shaking the hand with the practiced enthusiasm he would a challenger, smile taut.  "I am Emmet. It's very nice to meet you, Gym Leader Candice. We are all uninjured. Just very tired. It isn't far to the city, right?" 

"Oh!" She stands straighter, peering closer at the four of them and stumbling into a rapid nod. They must look awful. "Yes! Sorry, you probably didn't need us to come get you to begin with, it's just… " She trails off. 

Elesa hums a high-low rebuttal, waving her hand dismissively. "Don't worry about it at all. It was kind of you to come check on us, and you're helping to make sure Dawn gets to where she needs to. That's what matters."

Elesa conducts the interaction from there, falling easily into her usual role so that they resume forward progress without further delay. It takes a brief argument with Palmer to convince him not to fly off with Dawn on Dragonite, Elesa taking Ingo's hand when he raises his voice, just too much, after Palmer speaks over Dawn's quiet insistence that they stay together for this last leg. Apologetic but easily distracted, Palmer segues into mock disbelief at the lack of flying Pokemon between trainers of their caliber as Barry recounts the trek from Lake Valor. 

True to Ingo's memory, it's not far before the trees around the snow-crusted clearing converge around a narrow trail that flows out to the shore, now a wharf. The trees themselves are new, but the tracks they demarcate has long led between the hollow where the Pearl Settlement stood and the wider Icelands. No longer a bridge, as the Lake's overflow had since been dammed to make way for ski slopes and travelers' routes. And no longer a settlement, yurts and terraces flattened to make way for neat, if scant, pockets of tall brick buildings sheathed by snow-capped, young pines.  

Another change he long imagined, but expectation does nothing to dull the ache. He had known, too, from the descent down from Lake Acuity to expect the transformation that rises before him now. But to stand amidst the difference, dwarfed by time, knots his stomach all the same. 

A shoulder bumps against his. Emmet, with Sneasel peeking up at him from her nest in his arms, tilts his head, somewhere between questioning and sympathetic. "Different?" 

"Immeasurably," Ingo says, and holds out his arms. "May I?" 

Emmet nods, and Ingo gathers Sneasel close to his chest, feeling her heartbeat through the thick fabric of his tunic and taking in the almost-sweet smell of her fur. Eyes closed, Ingo can feel Emmet watching him, and wishes for all his words he had the ones to explain this grief. Though he knows he would make the same choice, time and time again, to return to his time and to his family, it does not staunch the feeling of impossible loss. 

All he had known, the Pokemon he had cherished and the people who had saved him, had lived and died after he left. How can he look at their home now and see nothing of them, only the old Celestica Temple looming above them, which long preceded them and outlives them still?

And he knows that it's his engineer's mind that yearns to find them in the infrastructure and the tangible. Lost as he was in Hisui, he could never dissuade himself of his own notions of space. There had always stayed with him the urge to mark the land with that which his own two hands had built. That had been Uncle Drayden's influence, Ingo understands now, the very same that led them to mold their Subway into the shape of their dreams. 

That the space was theirs was antithetical to what the Clan held dear. Far more important was that the space granted by the Almighty Sinnoh survived them, still inhabited and tended, leveled as it has been in Jubilife's image. 

All this Ingo knows and yet he finds himself wrecked by the realization that they won't have graves. 

It wouldn't haven't occurred to him to mourn this then, their funerary customs being all he’d have known. But now, at the precipice of who he was and is and will be again, he's no more than a little Unovan boy, taught history in physical things, in relics and monuments and lineage. 

Sneasel turns herself onto her haunches and bops Ingo on his nose with the flat of her claw. He blinks, looking into her wide, red eyes and struggling to not see her mother's wordless comforts on the end of another anxiety attack. This time, he is not huddled in a cave or bundled in his camp, and Emmet watches him with searching, bloodshot eyes, his hand clamped around Ingo's forearm. 

So he forces his voice from his oxygen-starved chest to his throat and says, "I apologize for derailing. I am alright, I assure you." 

"You don't need to apologize. Or worry about me. What do you need? We can switch tracks."

He looks ahead, where Palmer leads the kids in long strides across the dock. Elesa, a few paces behind them with Candice, hesitates, noticing they’ve fallen behind, and casts a glance over her shoulder. Emmet's grip on his arm loosens at what Ingo assumes count as signs of lucidity, and he follows his stare from Elesa back towards the city. It stands glinting in the waning daylight, coated in yesterday's snowfall, entirely benign if not for Ingo's attachment to the remains it's built upon. 

"Ingo?" Elesa calls, loud enough that Dawn looks back towards them. 

And he will not delay her. Her eyes catching his, all furrowed-brow worry, is easily enough to restore his systems to working order. It's always been easier to make decisions like these on another's behalf, to be the person he believes they need him to be, and this time the tendency is enough to move him. 

Ingo shakes his head, exaggerating the motion like Emmet would so that it is visible to Dawn and the others across the wharf. "No need," he says to Emmet, willing his feet to carry him forward. Emmet's hand on his arm falls away. "I am ready to proceed." 

Emmet's stare bores holes in his back, but he does not protest and soon his footsteps echo along the snowy planks as he follows. They proceed down the harbor past a dockyard that reeks of oil and paint, entering the city proper by way of a stone stairway, recently salted. The Gym stands proud at the city center, halogen-lit with wide glass windows adorned with posters and notices. The handful of people about stop to watch them as they pass. Ingo, held head high and stare straight, steadfastly ignores any thoughts as to whose yurts once stood where, focusing instead on Sneasel as she gnaws playfully on a gloved finger. 

They turn a corner. The bright red of a Pokemon Center filters past the neat treeline and the nearest buildings. Their procession stalls, petering out to a full stop as they gather together. Ingo catches sight of someone, a woman, waiting underneath the Center's awning. 

The woman turns towards them, and the resemblance is unmistakable. Her daughter has the same eyes. 

Dawn's mother finds her child amidst the mess of them, and her hands fly to her lips, and even paces away Ingo can see that they're shaking. 

" Mom!" 

Dawn crosses the last stretch of road in an instant, barreling into her mother and throwing arms around her waist. Her mother's shock dissipates, and she pulls Dawn closer, folding herself around her daughter. Dawn's frame heaves with bodily sobs, and muffled into her mother's chest, Ingo can hear her desperate, reedy apologies. 

Her mother, meanwhile, murmurs comforts into the quiet space between them, and Ingo wishes for his cap to lower over his eyes, finding himself an outsider to their emotions. He settles for looking at the ground, over Sneasel in his arms, fixated on the shoe-print array tread into the snow. 

In his peripherals, he notes that Barry and Palmer approach, Barry hauling Lucas by the hand behind him. Sneasel coos, Dawn keens , and Ingo's heart is at once unbearably full and impossibly heavy. 

He tries not to wonder what this could have been had their memories not been tampered with. Underneath that, he tries not to wonder what wouldn't have been, had his memory stayed on his arrival to Hisui. 

Instead of what he cannot change, he clings to the blanket of respite that finds him now that he can say he kept his word. Perhaps she is not home, not yet, but Dawn is safe and loved in her mother's arms. Ingo would not claim to have brought her here, knowing full well what she’s accomplished on her own. But she had asked him to accompany her. And he would again, every time, just to see her as she is now, the last traces of her guard breaking away as her mother holds her and they cry together, surrounded by family. 

To think that he had the joy of being her family, too, leaves him a little weightless. Relief and love buoys him, exhausted as he is, light like the pleasure of a fleeting moment, finite and wonderful all the same. 

"Ingo?" Dawn's voice cracks as she calls for him. When he looks up, she is nudging her way past Barry and Palmer, her mother in tow. The woman pats at her eyes with the curve of her palm, red-faced but smiling. Dawn is equally teary, but her expression is determined as she approaches. She’s given away only by the slight wobble in her pursed lips. "Ingo, please--" She hiccups, face scrunching to attempt holding back more tears. “This is my mom. Um, Johanna. I want you all to meet her.”

She stops a pace away, wrapping her arm tight around her mother's, looking up at her with pleading eyes. "Mom, I have so much to explain, but I need you to know first that I wasn't alone. So when you worry, know that I didn't have to do it by myself. Okay?"

"Okay, sweetheart. Okay. I'm so--I’m so glad you had someone with you, sweetie. And you weren't alone," says Johanna, fragile but still soothing in a way reserved for adults reassuring kids that have worried them. Ingo aches with sympathy for her. 

"This is Ingo," Dawn says, free hand gesturing at him and then sweeping across the others beside him. "And this is his family: Emmet, Iris and Elesa. They're like you, because Ingo was like me. He was with me, and they forgot him."

At this, Johanna looks ill, paling with a breathless gasp. The tremor in her voice more pronounced, she asks, "How many people did this happen to?" 

Ingo is unsure whether it's better or worse to explain that it's only the two of them. That it wasn't random, a cruelty of chance vice an act of will, could assuage the fear that it could happen again, or the distress that it happened without cause. But what comfort could be found in the truth that her child had been singled out by powers beyond them all, and their agency severed in its unbidden contract? 

Quieter now, Dawn says, "Just us. Ingo was the only one like me. He helped me realize that I could come home. I started to remember, because of him.”

There's the necessary question-- why, why her, why them --plain on her mother's face as she watches her daughter explain. But, hearing her, she softens, reaching across to wipe away a stray tear rolling down Dawn’s cheek. And then she inspects him with the same curiosity that Dawn had, watching him as he led her through Wayward Cave. So close to her, the resemblance fractures into a vision of Dawn older, lines at the corner of the same gray eyes and streaks of white in her slate hair. 

Ingo finds his voice. "Your daughter is a hero. It is not my story to tell, but you should know that she fought to return to you. When we could remember nothing, she knew how much you love her, and in turn how much she loves you. I owe everything to her courage, and can think of no greater honor than to have accompanied her to her station."

Beside him, Emmet hums in agreement. "Dawn brought my brother home. And she helped us remember him. I know she's already a hero here in Sinnoh before all this. But know that she's a hero to Unova now, too. We’re all in her debt." 

"Which is to say," Elesa adds, soft and sincere. "If there's anything you need, let us know. I realize you have the Sinnoh League backing you up, but we want to make sure Dawn is okay. She means the world to us." 

Dawn begins to cry in earnest then, biting down hard on her lip before realizing the losing battle and buckling, sinking towards the ground with a sob. Her mother follows with tearful whispers of "oh, sweetie" and " shh, baby, it's alright." 

Dawn's hand reaches and pulls twice at his pant leg. Setting Sneasel onto the ground beside them, Ingo follows as bid, kneeling into the thin layer of snow and rubs small circles on her back. Her mother quickly adjusts, and with a watery invitation--"Come on now"--he's pulled into their arms.

"Thank you," her mother whispers, and for the second time today, Ingo weeps.