Chapter Text
It was a simple Saturday morning. The weather was nice, so Gardenia decided to do a hike on Mt. Coronet.
The sky remained clear, the pokemon living in the mountain were quiet. Everything was normal, but she couldn’t avoid feeling like something was wrong. Maybe the magnetism in the zone was messing with her? She didn’t know, so she ignored it. It was only a feeling, after all.
Along the way, she picked and replanted the berries she found, occasionally also picking up flowers she liked. Her roserade also did the same.
It was when they were nearing Spear Pillar that the feeling she felt before became bigger, and this time roserade seemed to feel it too.
When they entered the cave right before the ruins, the feeling suddenly made sense.
There were two unconscious men laying on the floor. One of them had a skuntank, a golbat and a drapion, also unconscious, by his side and a strange voltorb that seemed to be made of wood above him. The other man only had a white sneasel. Could it be shiny? No, it couldn’t be. She recalled Candice bragging about having caught one and it was pink, not to mention that the white sneasel had purple patterns in its fur that made it look like a poison type. Both of these strange pokemon were really startled, but they weren’t hurting the men, in fact, they were trying to wake them up.
Roserade was the first to approach them, then Gardenia also got closer.
The man with more pokemon had long purple hair and was wearing a dark blue hoodie with some sort of logo that she didn’t recognize on the chest. In the lower part of the hoodie he also had embroidered an electrode, also wooden like the voltorb on top of him. The other man seemed more familiar. He wore a similar hoodie, but white and with a different logo. Over the hoodie he wore a torn off jacket, black with brown stripes at the bottom, which matched his conductor hat. Wait… Now she knew why the man looked familiar, that was the Subway Bosses’ uniform! Could he be Ingo? Gardenia wasn’t really familiar with the twins, but she knew Ingo had gone missing a few years back, that’s why Volkner started working as a temporary replacement. If he was indeed Ingo, she had to inform his brother as quickly as possible, but she preferred to confirm his identity first and of course, lead the two men to a safer place.
She sat down to be at their level. Most of their skin was covered, so she couldn’t tell if they had any wounds, but at least she didn’t see any blood. The pokemon were all fine. She also noticed both of them had bracelets with symbols resembling the pokemon that were trying to wake them up.
Gardenia tried to check for pulse, but doing that startled the voltorb, causing it to spill electricity, which woke the man up. Well, at least he was alive, and he didn’t seem to care about the sudden electrical charge.
“Ugh… What in Almighty Sinnoh’s, I mean Almyghty Dialga’s name has happened? My head hurts…”
He sat up and saw the voltorb.
“Oh my, what are you doing here? You should be in the Moonview arena, your father will get mad. How do you plan on becoming the next lord if you’re like this?” He spoke to the pokemon like he was a babysitter.
The voltorb let out a sound to indicate confusion, gardenia couldn’t blame it, she was even more confused, but that didn’t stop her from speaking.
“Are you hurt?”
The man turned his head to face her and then he looked down to where Ingo was.
“I’m not, but this old man could be. What are you doing here anyways? Aren’t you from the agriculture corps?”
“The what?”
That man didn’t make sense at all, at least he was okay, but every word he spoke only confused her more.
“Oh, you aren’t from the Galaxy Team? But you don’t seem to be from either clan. Do you work for the Gingko Guild?”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about. I’m Gardenia, Eterna City’s gym leader, but the concern here is who you are.”
“I’m sorry you’re a leader? What is a gym? And since when are there cities in Hisui? And the most important thing, how can anyone not know about the great Melli?”
Well, at least she now knew his name. She decided to ignore him and went over to the other man, who had woken up due to their conversation.
“Hello, my name is Gardenia, gym leader of Eterna City. I found you and Melli unconscious on the ground, can you tell me your name so I can help you?”
He looked around him. Though his expression didn’t change, he looked worried about hearing his situation.
“My name is Ingo. I am very thankful for your help, but you don’t need to worry, I know the tracks of this place like my own hand.”
Yep, he was indeed Ingo, the subway boss, but how could he know how to navigate Mt. Coronet? He was Unovan.
“I understand you’re not prone to getting lost, but I’m afraid you’re not in the state to go down Mt. Coronet alone. Just a minute ago, you were unconscious, so please accept my help.”
Melli had already stood up.
“Excuse me, but we were going to the Temple of Sinnoh, and we don’t need help from someone who’s probably an outsider.”
“You mean Spear Pillar? Wait!”
Melli had walked off and towards the upper entrance of the cave, which leads to the ruins, just to trip on the first slab of the stairs because he wasn’t looking where he was going. Just after, Ingo pulled out a pokeball and a machamp came out, picking Melli up and bringing him to where the other two were, but without letting him go.
“We accept your help, Gym Leader Gardenia, now, could you please lead us to a safe place?”
“A warden of the Pearl Clan needing help to navigate a space? How ironic.”
“Melli, no offence but you’re the one who tripped on some stairs that weren’t there before.”
Gardenia didn’t know what a “warden” was, but she remembered reading something about the Pearl Clan and the Diamond Clan too. They were two groups that habited Sinnoh in the past but that merged with other groups in the 20th century, so why was Melli referring to Ingo as someone from the Pearl Clan? Could Ingo, and subsequently Melli too, be one of those people that fell from a wormhole to another place? If they indeed were, she would be dealing with something way more serious than just a mysterious man and a missing person being found.
When they exited the cave, her suspicions were confirmed. When they saw the towns and cities in the distance, they suddenly stopped, faces full of shock. The pokemon were surprised too, Machamp even letting Melli free.
Ingo turned to Gardenia.
“Excuse me, Gym Leader Gardenia, but what year is it?”
When she gave her answer, Melli had to pinch himself to check he was not dreaming, he looked like he was about to faint. Ingo, on the other hand, was unreadable. He resorted to returning Machamp to its pokeball.
“I understand this is a really big shock. For now, let’s go to my house and I’ll explain everything there.”
The two men nodded. She decided that flying down would be better, so she sent out tropius. The three of them climbed to the pokemon’s back. Voltorb also went up and sneasel clinged into Ingo’s back. The golbat flew into the air, but the other two pokemon that followed them couldn’t do that.
“Melli, are those your pokemon?”
“Yes, but they don’t really seem to have space in this palm tree’s back.2
“Then why don’t you put them in their pokeballs?”
“Pokeballs? That is insulting, they don’t have pokeballs!”
“Oh, okay… So… Ingo, do you have any pokemon that can fly?”
“A gliscor, my strongest in fact!”
“That's perfect, do you think it can with two big pokemon?
“We can try.”
He sent out gliscor, who picked up both of Melli’s pokemon in the best way he could. It struggled a bit, but they managed to get to eterna. Thanks Arceus it was near.
Once they reached the house, both Melli and Ingo sat down on the sofa, while Gardenia started to prepare some tea.
“Just a quick safety tip: DON’T touch anything before I explain how it works.”
The men looked around the room they were in. Gardenia’s house was full of various plants and most of the furniture was wooden. The mixture of the plants obscuring things and all the wood made it easier for them to process. Over where Gardenia was preparing the tea was weirder though. It was full of extrange machines. They remembered seeing some of them at Akari’s room, but theirs were an orangi red, while those were mostly white. They started to understand the advice she had given. Another thing that caught their attention was the big black mirror on one side of the room.
“Ok, I’m done with the tea, enjoy!”
Each one of them grabbed their respective cup.
“Now, I have a very important thing to explain, and it’s about you, Ingo.”
“Me?”
“Yes… So the thing is, you actually went missing about 7 years ago.”
“Wait, so I come from this time?”
“Most certainly. How did you end up in the past?”
“There was a space-time rift, and I fell through it. I don’t have any memories from before that incident, so forgive me for my lack of knowledge.”
“Don’t worry, I completely understand. Now, I guess you would like to know about your family.”
Ingo’s face lit up, even if his expression didn’t change.
““I have a family!? Please, tell me everything you can!”
“So, I never knew you or anyone from your family, but I do know you have a twin brother. His name is Emmet and he’s nearly identical to you.”
“And where can I meet my brother?”
“That’s a little bit more complicated. The thing is… Right now, we’re in Sinnoh, I don’t know how you’d call it, but you definitely can identify Mt. Coronet.”
“Yes, the Coronet Highlands, but then, where’s my brother?”
“Your brother, and before you fell through that you too, lives in Unova, another region that’s on the other side of the world, but don’t worry, we can contact him.”
“We can, how?”
Gardenia pulled out her smartphone.
“Nowadays we have the possibility of talking with someone in real time, no matter where they are. We can use multiple things to do this, but a very popular option is what I’m holding, a mobile phone. That’s because we can carry them anywhere since they’re so small.”
Ingo leaned over to see the phone better while Melli just stared blankly into his coffee.
“Woah, technology has really come a long way.”
“I know right?”
She opened the phone and searched for Volkner’s number.
“Now, you have to understand that if I wanted to talk to someone, I’d need something like a phone number or a mail address, for example. I don’t have either of them to contact your brother, but I do know one of his coworkers.”
She called Volkner. She didn’t really expect him to respond, he barely responded to messages, let alone calls, but the matter on hand was important enough to call him. She could try to maybe DM Emmet, but she doubted someone who was the equivalent of a frontier brain had open DMs.
Surprisingly, Volkner picked up.
“What in the actual fuck do you want Gardenia! It’s past midnight for Arceus sake, you woke me up!”
“Oops, sorry, forgot about timezones, but I swear it’s worth it.”
“Ughhh, make it quick.”
“I found Ingo.”
===
Volkner hung up immediately after hearing that and dressed himself as quickly as he could. He had to inform Emmet now, he didn't care that it was the middle of the night.
Him running to the front door also woke Elesa up.
“Volkner what are you-”
“Ingo appeared!”
“Hey, you know it’s not a topic to joke about…”
“I’m being serious! Gardenia found him in Sinnoh, I have to inform Emmet quickly!”
She stood in silence for a moment.
“Wait, let me get changed too.”
Some minutes after, they were waiting outside for a couple of mandibuzzes Elesa had called. The subway lines didn’t run during night and with no pokemon with flight on any of their teams, it was the only option to reach Anville Town. In moments like these, they genuinely wondered how could Emmet live so far away from Nimbassa, or any other place in Unova for that matter.
After some more minutes of impatient waiting, the Mandibuzzes finally came and they parted to the isolated town.
They rang on Emmet’s doorbell.
After some seconds, he opened the door.
“Who are you… Ah, hello Elesa, hello Volkner, an emergency?”
They clearly had woken him up. Ah well, it was worth it.
“Kind off, but a good one.” Elesa said.
“A good emergency…?”
“Yeah, I guess that doesn’t make sense, but we do have got news, really good news.”
“I like good news. Come in.”
They went to the living room, trying not to stomp on any joltik on the way there.
“You might have to sit down for this.” Volkner mentioned, and Emmet did as told.
Volkner got his phone out to call Gardenia while Elesa explained what happened.
“Basically, one of Sinnoh’s gym leaders found Ingo.”
Emmet stared at his friend surprised.
“It’s that true?” His voice trembled. Even Elesa couldn’t tell what he was feeling.
“Gardenia wouldn’t lie about something like this.” Just after Volkner said that, the gym leader picked up. He made it so the other two could participate in the call.
“Hey, you didn’t let me finish. So basically, I found Ingo and another guy unconscious near Spear pillar, with some pokemon around them. Don’t worry, they’re fine now, in fact, I have them with me right now.”
They heard a low hello coming from the other end of the phone. Was it said by Ingo or the other guy?
Emmet got closer to the phone.
“You’re with my brother? Please, let me talk to him!” He yelled.
“Are you Emmet? Then you can talk to him, but before that I do have something to explain. So, basically, he got sent to the past and lost his memories, so consider that.”
“Ye-yeah, I’ll consider that.”
There was a moment of silence on the other end that was broken by a way too familiar voice. He took Volkner’s phone out of his hands.
“Hello? Are you my brother? Gym Leader Gardenia called you Emmet. A pleasure to meet you, but as she said, I don’t have my memories, so unfortunately I don’t remember you.”
Emmet was about to tear up.
“Ingo? Is that really you? I- I don’t even know what to say… I-”
“Take your time Emmet, but how about we turn this into a video call?” Elesa suggested.
Emmet nodded, so they told Ingo to hold the phone screen so it reflected his face and pressed the button to make a video call.
The screen now showed a worn off hat. Ingo’s hat. Emmet was even closer to crying.
“Ingo, your face doesn’t show up, let me hold the phone.” They heard Gardenia say from the other side.
The camera tilted and moved so that both Ingo’s and Gardenia’s face.
His clothes were broken, he obviously looked older and he had grown a goatee, but it was Ingo. It was really his brother Ingo.
“Whoa, you do really look similar. Again, I’m really glad to meet you, Emmet.”
He couldn’t say anything, he just started crying out of the excitement, but also out of all the things he felt during the years he had been gone. Elesa decided to speak on his behalf.
“Please excuse him, these last 7 years have been really hard for him. I’m Elesa by the way, also a gym leader like Gardenia, but most importantly, Emmet’s best friend, and before you disappeared, yours too.”
“I really can’t wait to be with you.”
“We feel the same, but I don’t think it’s a good idea for you to fly right now, so we should really go to Sinnoh.”
“Yeah, we- we should go to Sinnoh.” Emmet managed to get that phrase out of his mouth.
Volkner just smiled at them and did a thumbs up.