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That was all well and good, but Ingo used his for its classic purpose, and he could not find it.

He was so careful about keeping it tucked safely behind his mask when they were out and about and conflict could arise at any moment, but he’d never seen any reason to keep it on his lack-of-person at home. His mistake because, apparently, mediating an argument between Crustle and Archeops counted.

The other Pokemon helped him look, tearing through the apartment in search of the stone, just as afraid as their late trainer. Yamask were a well documented species, from their grim origins to their lingering humanity and the fact that they remembered who they’d been in life. Living as one such creature was different, but not unthinkable. Cofagrigus… were a different story. It was an accepted fact that Cofagrigus not only lost their unique memories, but any recollection of having been human in the first place.

Ingo had already lost all sense of self once; suffice to say, he was not eager to take the next logical step.

Thus, the collective mad dash through the apartment, trying to find his everstone before the pulse where his heart should have been grew any more powerful. It might have been a comfort, a reminder of his time as a living creature, if he hadn’t already known what it meant.

He didn’t want to evolve. He didn’t want to risk the life he’d regained, the family he’d finally found. In theory, he could have rejected evolution outright, but he didn’t have that instinct or knowledge-- since his first scare, the only thing holding it at bay had been the everstone.

The edges of his vision went starburst-white and he accidentally scattered a collection of documents in his haste to check over the desk. Humming nervously, he backed off and tried to fight the sensation down, but in focusing, it just made it that much more undeniable-- and once he was fixated on it, there was no turning away, not unless he wanted to let go and evolve on the spot.

He felt sturdy wrought iron arms curve around him, and a warm bulk huddling in close. Somewhere in the fog of it all, steel claws deposited a familiar weight behind his mask, but for all he appreciated Excadrill’s success, it was too little too late.

It was a surprise to open his eyes again, knowing who and what he was.

The Pokemon surrounding him looked on with a tentative sort of hope. Chandelure’s arm was still braced along his back, Haxorus boxed him in and Excadrill tapped her claws nervously. Archeops, Garbodor, Klinklang and Crustle formed a secondary ring, unable to get closer, but were still paying careful attention to what was going on.

Ingo lifted a hand and stared at it for several seconds. He had four of them now, a distant part of him noted, which was nice, because he could use them to reach out to multiple Pokemon at once. There was an immediate uproar when he put this plan into motion, and a scramble to crowd in as far as they could. Their voices were distinct enough to pick out one by one, but all said the same thing: how relieved they were that he still knew them, how afraid they’d been, and how sorry they were to have been unable to prevent this.

The last point was kind of them, but it was his own fault. He felt terrible for worrying them, and--

Sinnoh above, how was he going to communicate this to Emmet?

---

Historically, Ingo wasn’t one to sleep in, which had made the past three mornings noteworthy. Being that they had work, Emmet hadn’t had any choice but to rouse the lethargic Yamask, but today they were off, and so he’d let his brother rest.

There had to be a reason for it, even if it wasn’t immediately discernible. Maybe he’d been using too much energy on the subway lately, or there was a Lampent neither of them had noticed, feeding from him. It could have been down to something as simple as size-- he was so much smaller than he used to be that maybe the pace they’d always kept was unsustainable. The list of options was long and varied.

Or-- Emmet thought, as he wandered through the apartment on his return, trying to figure out where everyone was-- maybe it had been something much more pressing.

He heard his name, lower and creakier than it should have been, and his blood ran cold. Breaking into a sprint, he rounded the corner and found his answers.

Maybe Ingo had been tired because his body was saving up the energy to evolve.

He staggered another step forward, one hand clasped over his mouth as if to contain the scream of grief building in his throat, and Archeops and Klingklang moved aside to let him. No, no, no. He’d just gotten his twin back, he couldn’t lose him again-- not like this. Not without even the chance to do something to help, to say goodbye.

Elesa called something down the hallway, but he didn’t process the words. He took another few steps without knowing why, the Pokemon parting to allow him forward, until, finally, he landed himself right in front of the Cofagrigus that had once been his brother. Too consumed with sorrow to notice the worry in its eyes or the way its four arms tentatively hovered around him, he felt himself wobble and stopped fighting against both gravity and his grief.

Hurried footsteps made their way down the hall. That fact seemed largely irrelevant, given the circumstance.

As he slid down to his knees, something touched his back, steadying him, and the rough version of Ingo’s voice spoke again, gently; the only thing Emmet could make out past the roaring in his ears was his name, and that was swiftly followed by a scream from the opposite side of the room.

One of the things-- arms, he belatedly realized, following one to its source-- reached to cradle his face.

“It’s okay, Emmet” Ingo repeated, slow, laborious, and exactly what he’d been telling him before, “I'm still here.”

There was, however, an additional factor making them even more dangerous than Ingo had been led to believe: if they weren’t content with trapping a human in their hallucinatory web and killing them, they would claim that unfortunate individual’s body for themselves.

He was made aware of this two months into living among the Pearls when, without fanfare, one of the villagers returned from foraging and turned on a friend. Without quite knowing where the instinct came from, he’d charged in and attempted to separate the pair, assisting Gaeric in holding Marii back while Irida fussed over Kiran.

Marii, uncharacteristically furious, refused to calm, thrashing against Gaeric’s chest; reluctantly, Ingo let himself be led away by a touch on the shoulder, and once Irida had gotten him to back off, Gaeric gave a piercing whistle. The warden’s Froslass was there in a matter of seconds, eyes alight with ghostly energy, and without a second’s hesitation, she barreled first through her trainer and the woman in his grasp-- emerging with a Zoroark snapping and writhing against her.

Driving it away from the settlement had been difficult at first as, unaffected by Hex, Froslass’s only recourse was to repeatedly use Powder Snow-- but this part, it seemed, Ingo was not only allowed to assist in, but encouraged. Gligar’s move pool didn’t boast any super effective attacks, but the variation helped keep the Zoroark off-balance and unable to predict what would come for it next, and, eventually, it was forced turn tail and flee.

His hand automatically drifted to Gligar’s head in thanks, and it anchored itself against his shoulder as he turned to regard those behind him. Gaeric gave him a triumphant thump on the arm-- Irida a small smile. Marii was limp in Kiran’s arms, the latter trembling minutely, and Gaeric hurried his stride to tend to them while Irida took Ingo to the side to explain.

He couldn’t claim to have known Marii prior to the event, but she was quiet in the following weeks, jumpy. The clan as a whole seemed wary of her in turn, as if half of them hadn’t witnessed the Zoroark expelled from her body; on top of her learned paranoia, that seemed like salt in the wound.

It was with an acute understanding of how the Pearl Clan’s distrust could weigh on a person that Ingo approached her; the poor girl had clearly been through something terrible. She needed support, not to be ostracized by her friends and peers-- and no one else would offer it, he would at least try.

Ultimately, Marii rebuffed Ingo’s attempt to help her but, with a troubled look in her eye, she’d taken the time to caution him, as someone at risk of Zoroark attacks. Be wary, act wisely-- and if the worst were to pass, be aware that the act of possession was painless, but the same couldn’t be said of being possessed.

So it was a dubious honor to be able to confirm that it was so much worse than she’d described.

Ingo could admit that he had become complacent. With a blank mind, there was only so much a Zoroark could use against him-- not nearly enough to craft a compelling illusion-- but, in time, new memories formed, and with them, psychic ammunition.

Which was to say nothing of the flame in the dark and his smiling reflection.

The exact same way awareness had returned to him, fleeting and ephemeral in the dimness of Wayward Cave, they’d dangled ahead in a building blizzard. In hindsight, he should have suspected; Zoroark didn’t stray far from the Icelands, but were known to chance the boundary between the wastes and Coronet. He’d been distracted, briefly, by the thought that the Pokemon he’d remembered would have been a wonderful ally in such harsh weather, and then… there had been a flicker. A purple mote in the sea of white. It would have been his duty to investigate regardless, but he should have been on his guard, not fantasizing about a Pokemon that may or may not have existed.

But he hadn’t. He’d been lured in and set upon.

Maybe Marii’s Zoroark had been kinder than his, or maybe she’d simply blocked the moment of possession from her memory, because it hit Ingo like the impact of a Steelix’s Iron Tail, sending him reeling back into a building pile of snow. He wanted to just lay there, to process what had happened, but without his say so, his body sat up and hurried off into the storm, leaving him as little more than an unwilling passenger.

There was something deeply wrong with the sensation, and it didn’t lessen as the days crawled by. Ingo wasn’t sure whether he was grateful not to cross paths with another human or if he wished someone might stumble across him, might somehow be able to assist.

Unfortunately, the latter came true. As the Zoroark boldly ventured into the Fieldlands, a greeting met its hijacked ears, quickly followed by Akari herself. Like Kiran before her, the girl was blithely unaware of the danger she was in, speaking a mile a minute about her ongoing research into Scyther.

Ingo wanted to be sick, but even the involuntary clenching of the stomach was beyond him.

The Zoroark didn’t attack. It allowed her to carve a path toward the village, content to maintain the ruse with a hum here and there. Akari seemed confused by the shift in demeanor-- he saw that odd looks she sent his way, but, locked away in a corner of his own being, could do nothing to warn her of the looming peril.

Helpless to interfere, he watched on as his body walked with her to the hill where Jubilife Village came into view.

Why, he wanted to ask, what was it hoping to accomplish? The language barrier was firm as it always had been, but forced together, he could feel the answering pulse of anguish, of absolute hatred for humanity and the desire to inflict it upon those who’d wronged its kind. He’d been told as much, back when Irida had explained the dangers a Zoroark posed, but it was eye opening to feel it firsthand. It was also… incredibly sad.

He might have spent more time with that idea had the Zoroark not chosen that moment to pounce.

While she didn’t have a ghost capable of exorcising the beast from his body, her Pokemon were perfectly capable of fighting back against a human; in spite of the Zoroark’s power in its own form, it could channel none of it through its stolen frame and was quickly overwhelmed. One huge Ursaluna paw pinned Ingo’s chest to the ground, and Akari’s face emerged from behind it, demanding to know what it was, what it had done to him.

The Zoroark, of course, had no words for her. It growled low in its stolen throat and Akari snarled back at it.

With Ursaluna keeping him under control and one hand holding his closest wrist safely away, she reached for one of his pokeballs-- not the first, which she would have known held Gliscor, but the third from the front. She seemed slightly surprised to get Tangrowth, and, deep in the jungle of vines that composed her body, the grass type’s eyes went wide at the scene set before her. She gave a distressed warble, cutting off only as she leaned in in an attempt to pry Ursaluna away from her trainer. Her vines went stiff, telegraphing her uncertainty, and when Akari asked her to carry him to town, she listened without complaint.

He would have wondered how wise that actually was, keenly aware of how eager certain Galaxy Team members were to see any abnormality as the whisper of a knife about to be plunged into their back, but it seemed to be more than just a whim.

If Ingo hadn’t thought he’d ever be back here, in the cell he’d spent the greater portion of two weeks occupying, then he certainly wouldn’t have considered an eventuality in which he’d be happy to be back, but there he was. Absent another ghost, this was the best he could have hoped for-- to be secured somewhere he couldn’t watch himself turn on another friend, helpless to intervene.

The Zoroark was… somewhat less enthusiastic with this turn of events. It responded to questioning the only way it could, in howls and barks, and grudgingly accepted the basic provisions supplied, but its patience dwindled within days.

With a sensation not dissimilar to being horrifically ill, it slipped out of his body, lunging toward the bars and slashing at today’s inquisitor, Zisu. Her arms flew to protect her face on instinct, and, likewise-- head swimming, struggling to parse what was going on around himself-- Ingo also leapt into action, tackling the beast to the ground and fighting to keep it there. Overhead, Zisu called to someone, but the words might as well have been another language entirely for all that Ingo understood what she’d said, preoccupied with keeping the threat beneath him neutralized.

That didn’t last long. Out of practice in controlling his own limbs, the Zoroark managed to flip the both of them, and Ingo’s back hit the ground-- hard-- as two hundred pounds of ghost pounced on him. Before it could savage him, however, it jolted as if struck from behind, a theory quickly proven by the pokeball that dropped onto him in its place. Hastily, he sat up, putting distance between himself and the bucking pokeball, just in case it broke free, but with a celebratory pop, the capsule locked shut, leaving the cell to lapse into a bewildered silence.

“Well, that explains a lot,” Zisu finally said, an uncertain chuckle cutting into the tension, “You, uh, you okay over there, warden?”

Aware of how badly he was shaking, Ingo inclined his head. His answering “Thank you, Miss Zisu,” came out far, far quieter than he’d known he was capable of.

“Of course,” She said, and, with a hard look at the cell, stepped closer, a hand dropping to her satchel. “Come on, now. After that show, I think we can get you out on good behavior.”

Unaware of the silent crisis happening behind him, Ingo went about buttoning his work shirt, pausing to shrug on the waistcoat he’d insisted on adding to his uniform.

That much was beginning to make more sense, now.

Before he could get it settled, Emmet called his name, and he half-turned, one hand idling beneath his sternum as if to smooth the shirt down.

“Is something the matter?”

Taking the question as invitation, Emmet stepped into the room properly, eyes never quite tearing away from the spot he’d seen. There was nothing visibly amiss through the extra layer of fabric, but it had still been faintly noticeable through the white dress shirt.

“There is a mark on your back.” He said, the lack of inflection serving him well for a change.

The response he got was a blank, legitimately puzzled stare. With the hand that wasn’t idling over his heart, Ingo reached blindly back, trying to understand. Wordlessly, Emmet took him by the wrist and guided the hand to the offending area, but the look of mild bewilderment didn’t shift.

“There’s… something there?”

Instead of offering what, at this point, would have been a redundant confirmation, Emmet asked, “May I look?”

A brief hesitation held the place of an answer, followed by the soft rumpling of fabric, but after a moment, Ingo nodded and took his hand away from where it pinned the clothes in place. After another beat of inaction, it became clear he had no intention of removing the shirt, and Emmet simply pushed it and the loose vest up, so as to get a better look.

He very pointedly didn’t touch, but he didn’t have to. Up close, when he hadn’t half-noticed out of the corner of his eye, it was perfectly clear what the dark spot had been: a dark panel of glass, just barely dampening the glow from the silver flame that flickered behind it.

The mark had no business being there-- or, at least, it wouldn’t have prior to Hisui. Knowing what he did, Emmet couldn’t necessarily be surprised to find it on his twin’s person, but was still dismayed at the realization.

There was little doubt that it was a scar signifying the bond between a human and Pokemon-- what else could it be, when it so resembled Chandelure’s radiant globe?-- but its presence suggested something substantially more grim: such marks only manifested where a close tie had saved a person from death. Something had all but killed Ingo, and he was only standing here by virtue of his connection to Chandelure.

On some level, Emmet understood the silence, but on another…

“What happened?” He asked, a question that demanded answer.

When Ingo looked over his shoulder, though, there was a genuine lack of comprehension, “I’m afraid I don’t follow. What happened to what?”

That was something to puzzle out later.

“You were hurt. Fatally. How?”

In rapid succession, his twin’s eyes narrowed in bemusement, and then went wide. As before, he reached back, searching, but didn’t need Emmet’s guidance to find the smooth panel along his spine. Emmet left him to the realization, busy with the perfect line between the point he’d first noticed and where Ingo had yet to drop the hand bunched up in his shirt-- both offset just slightly to the left. The one on his back was lower, but not by much. There were certain conclusions to be drawn from that.

With the newfound softness that Emmet was growing to hate, Ingo murmured, “I… didn’t realize...” and turned in full, gauging Emmet’s expression.

Emmet sighed, trying to breathe his building ire out with it, and reached up to brush his fingertips against the clenched hand.

“Will you show me?”

For just a second, it tensed, clutching more fervently to the wrinkling fabric, and then-- looking like he’d much rather do anything else-- Ingo gave a single nod. When he let go, his hand left a horribly rumpled patch in its wake, but more importantly, there was that same, faint glow, just barely permeating the layers he’d already donned. If the room had been any brighter, it might not have registered as anomalous.

When he tentatively bared the skin beneath, it showed the same window-- larger than the one on his back and closer to the flame, clearly much harder to keep dimmed. It also boasted delicate iron ribbing, identical to the curve of Chandelure’s arms.

He’d been struck clear through, then, from front to back. Emmet spared a brief thought for his brother’s newly acquired affinity for mountain climbing, but discarded it almost immediately; a fall onto a stalagmite would have been far larger and messier. This, on the other hand, seemed very straightforward.

Under the scrutiny, one of Ingo’s hands twitched upward, as if to shield the little window from view, but he resisted the urge. The timidity of the gesture was at extreme odds with the gravity in Ingo’s voice as he asked, “You’re correct in that it developed after I sustained a rather grievous wound, but Emmet, I have to ask: why do you know that?”

Emmet glanced up, inadvertently locking eyes with the searching gaze leveled at him, and blinked dumbly.

“It’s general knowledge.” He offered after a long, confusing moment, “The phenomena itself is not common. But you would be hard pressed to find someone unaware of it.”

Even as the words passed his lips, he realized he’d overlooked one rather important fact. Not for the first time, he’d forgotten to factor his twin’s amnesia into the equation. Dragons, what a mess this was.

“No.” He said almost immediately, aiming for reassurance, but relatively sure he’d fallen short, “I have not experienced it, personally. That is not something you need to worry about.”

Ingo relaxed marginally and, when he moved to pull the thin fabric of his dress shirt closed again, Emmet didn’t stop him. “Perhaps the knowledge is commonplace here, but back then, nobody was entirely certain what it meant. Irida saw it as a sign of Sinnoh’s favor. I believe she was in the minority.” He drew a slow, steady breath, “I’ve gathered that it signifies a killing blow, but don’t understand why it occurred; I’m far from the only person to have been injured so gravely.”

“Chandelure. It was because of Chandelure.” But, for all the overt similarities to the ghost, it didn’t explain the dark tint to the glass when she herself was a frosted white, “And… perhaps Gliscor as well. You told me the Hisuian people were wary of Pokemon. That is the difference. The bonds between people and Pokemon are capable of changing the tracks away from that terminal.”

Three buttons into refastening his shirt, Ingo seemed to remember the wadded up mess it had become, and abandoned the attempt, instead staring down at the muffled light. He closed his eyes and sighed, absently raising a hand to eclipse it, “That’s… but my memory of her was...”

Emmet let him sit with the thought for a few seconds, rummaging around for a new shirt in the meantime. When it seemed his brother was conducting himself into an unproductive circuit, he tossed the article over his head, to immediate, indignant, sputtering.

“You told me yourself that you remembered her out of everything you’d forgotten.”

Ingo pulled the shirt off of his head and shot his brother a significant look. Emmet waved it off.

“A nice thought. I do not believe twins possess that capability, however.”

“How do you know?” Came the immediate retort, “My ignorance did nothing to prevent this, so perhaps there’s a station you’ve missed as well.”

Emmet scoffed and turned away; he’d gotten distracted for understandable reasons, but if they delayed any longer, they’d almost certainly be late. While he’d already realized that it would be impossible to focus today, he went through the motions of his morning routine with the specter of ‘what if’ hanging over him. What if the force that had carried Chandelure’s love backwards through time hadn’t? What if Gliscor had still been too wary of its trainer? What if Ingo hadn’t remembered in time?

He knew perfectly well that there was no use in asking questions he’d never see the answer to-- that he was catastrophizing something that couldn’t have been more thoroughly in the past-- but he couldn’t get past the realization that his brother had nearly died in Hisui… that, by technicality, his brother had died in Hisui.

If they weren’t late, maybe he could make a last minute adjustment to the schedule-- to rearrange it so they were running the Multi lines for the day. For now, he on his own would be a lackluster opponent, and their challengers deserved better than that. He also wanted to thank Chandelure and Gliscor properly. Really, coupling their cars for the day would be in everyone’s best interest.

He wasn’t entirely sure when it was that Ingo cut in, steering him back on course, but as they reached the door, his twin paused.

“As much as I’d like to leave this matter at home, there’s one fact I wanted to impress upon you.” He reached over and took one of his brother’s hands, resting it over the hidden patch of glass, “You can certainly see Chandelure’s influence, and I believe you’re correct about Gliscor. The flame beneath isn’t purple, however.”

He let their hands drop, but didn’t release Emmet’s as they crossed the threshold.

“I can’t help but wonder what that might mean.”

All that was to say that Ingo’s hands had sustained a great deal of damage over the years, and it showed. They weren’t the only run-down parts he possessed, nor were they the worst affected, but they were, without a doubt, the easiest to spot.

He was incredibly grateful that, since his return to Unova, nobody seemed to have noticed-- even when he’d lacked anything to shield them beneath. He’d gotten away with hiding his free hand in a pocket while Emmet did a spectacular-- if unintentional-- job of obscuring the other from view, loathe to lose a point of contact for more than a few minutes. It had worked at the time, but there was no sense in tempting Sinnoh, and when Ingo had seen the opportunity to replace his long-departed gloves, he took it.

It might have seemed silly, to be so caught up in hiding scars that had since healed over, but Ingo had quickly realized that he couldn’t let them be seen.

He was certain that Emmet hadn’t meant to disclose so much, but his twin had been so caught up in his relief that he’d confessed to the fears he’d been living with all this time: that Ingo had been stranded somewhere, hurt and alone, beyond their reach.

Some half-buried instinct had risen from the back of his subconscious at the admission; Ingo couldn’t, under any circumstance, let his brother know that those fears had been the truth he’d lived through. Their family had already suffered through his disappearance, would need to cope with a man who was only half of what he should have been. There was no need for them to concern themselves with marks best left in the distant past.

Not everything could be hidden, of course, but that had also worked to his advantage. While he tried to highlight the positive and downplay any unfavorable facts, it was simply unrealistic to act as though none existed; he conceded that yes, he was underweight due to a shortage of supplies, and agreed that the subconscious slant of his back required correction. Acknowledging these points seemed to do the trick-- it gave his family specific points of interest to focus on and blurred the details he didn’t want them to notice.

There were days where keeping up the gambit became incredibly difficult-- where a story he’d been cajoled into telling veered too close to reality, where hidden injuries twinged in ways that were difficult to ignore, or he had to moderate his breathing and duck out of the way to rein in his racing heart-- but he grit his teeth as best he could and weathered it. It was nothing he hadn’t dealt with in the past; if he could do it then, he could keep it silent now. It was for a good cause.

On those days, the Pokemon were a godsend, all of them, regardless of how well he remembered their relationship: Chandelure’s soft crooning and gentle warmth, his bratty weighted blanket of a Gliscor, the ever-sensitive Eelektross with Baby Doll Eyes, Sneasler, unafraid to boss him around when he insisted on pushing himself, the list could go on for hours. And sometimes it was… nice to be fussed over. To admit that it hurt and accept help. In this regard, Pokemon were more practical than humans tended toward, and while they might worry, it was based in the here and now instead of directed toward things they couldn’t change.

So Ingo truly believed he was doing rather well. He was able to manage his bad days and use the good ones to reconnect with the life he’d mostly forgotten, causing minimal worry along the way. It was everything he’d set out to accomplish… undone by one simple factor:

The friends and family he was trying to shield from the harshness of Hisui began to look into it. For his sake. To better understand where he was coming from.

And there was nothing he could say to dissuade them without giving up the ruse.

Maybe ‘random’ wasn’t entirely fair-- it had clearly been used as a den for some time, and boasted more furnishing than your standard mountainside hole-- but it didn’t matter. If the Hisuian tales of someone ‘neither man nor Pokemon’ inspired visitors, they would be hard pressed to find the right entryway out of the many tunnels that littered the territory.

That wasn’t the point, anyway. The point was that Emmet intended to stay sprawled here for the next few centuries, and Ingo didn’t seem compelled to alter that course; there was a low, content rumble of thunder beneath him, and Emmet took that as an all clear.

He hadn’t appreciated just how much the world could change, independent of human truths or ideals, until stepping foot into the bitter cold of Hisui. It had been a miserable slog from the Alabaster Icelands, and that was speaking as a fire type; he didn’t want to imagine what the trip might have been like without an internal pilot light to burn away the worst of it.

The less said of traversing it with a proper type vulnerability, the better. If he could pretend he was just huddling near to save his twin the sleepy discomfort of a Nimbasan winter, wonderful-- it meant he didn’t have to dwell on the earnestness of Ingo’s “You’re so warm,” like the concept had never even occurred to him. It meant he didn’t need to consider a reality where his other half had known only the freezing cold, unaware that he was supposed to have a counterbalance to protect him from it.

He let out a disgruntled huff of breath and rested his chin atop his brother’s head, ignoring the minor tilt as Ingo shot him a sideways look; the darker dragon settled back down within the moment, either unwilling or unable to raise a complaint, and, frankly, Emmet didn’t care which one it was. All that mattered right now was getting him warmed up, and there was nobody better suited to the task than Reshiram himself.

---

It wasn’t saying much, but in all his years, Ingo hadn’t realized that it was possible to be so warm.

Hisui ran cold, but that wasn’t to say it was without its more temperate locations. The Coastlands had Firespit Island, and the Mirelands were… bearable; in areas lacking snow’s ambient chill, it was possible to bask in the sun and not feel the cloying grasp of an inescapable winter.

For quite some time, he’d thought it was just him. While humans like Irida and Gaeric had an immunity to the tundra that left their peers in awe, as a whole, they didn’t seem to suffer the perpetual frostbite that Ingo did. Pokemon, too, were able to weather it with little difficulty, their type depending.

The closest he’d ever come to seeing eye to eye in this regard had been with the Garchomp Akari trained-- and even he hadn’t known what Ingo was talking about. Yes, it agreed, the cold was terrible and the fact that its kind nested in such harsh climes was ridiculous-- but it wasn’t anything that couldn’t be remedied by nestling into a den or sprawling next to a fire.

There hadn’t been any point in arguing-- never mind that Ingo spent the greater portions of the winter holed up with Sneasler and her clowder. He could concede that it was orders better than being stranded in the snow, but it wasn’t…

He didn’t know what it wasn’t. Enough? It should have been. Sneasler was under no obligation to allow him so close to her young-- not when he was a complete unknown. It wasn’t right? Who was he to make such a bold claim? For the Sneasel and their mother, it was perfect-- if he had a problem with it, that was his burden to bear.

It wasn’t ideal, he supposed-- not his, at least.

Maybe something in him had frozen, back before he’d woken up, and all of Hisui’s scant warmth combined wasn’t enough to thaw him out. He’d all but resigned himself to lifetime of it, and could admit that he was… dumbstruck to find an alternate station.

Firespit Island burned, too intense to stay put and let the outermost edges of his permafrost melt, leaving them to build right back up as soon as he stepped away. For a moment, The Other’s touch had felt just the same, but it wasn’t. Though Ingo had nothing in living memory to compare the sensation to, he knew it was familiar. Right. Ideal.

And, more to the point, it was enough. The frost had spent too long building to thaw with a single touch, but in that moment the glacier inside of him had calved, bringing to light information that had been since buried in ice.

That was his Other! Emmet--? Reshiram? Both? His twin! His other half!

In short order, the intense heat mellowed enough for Ingo to realize that it hadn’t ever been so hot as to burn-- only to warm. It was simply that he, himself, had been too cold to feel even mildly tepid and not flinch away from the perceived threat.

He wasn’t really cognizant of how and when they’d gotten to his den, but when he tuned back into reality, he was at home with his brother draped over his back, radiating more heat than was practical. Something deep in the build up of ice resonated with that observation-- it was normal, he thought. Emmet always ran warm, even when they presented as humans; the real challenge was keeping him from getting excited and subconsciously turning any given room into a sauna.

A moment later, Ingo caught up to himself and the… odd implications of that thought. Humans? He would tuck it away for later, when he had the wherewithal to do more than rumble his contentment while his twin grumbled about keeping him pinned for the next several centuries.

While he couldn’t live up to the threat in full, Emmet certainly did his best to prove the point. Once he deigned to get to his feet, there was a noticeable chill in the air. Ingo had never known this cave to be particularly drafty-- it was why he’d chosen it in the first place-- leaving him to wonder if the breeze had always been there and he just hadn’t noticed.

But his twin didn’t have time for his philosophizing, it seemed, and yanked him upright without a word; as soon as they were eye to eye, he pressed their heads together and hummed. The warmth in the form before Ingo was still there, but muted-- not because he’d grown complacent, but because he could still feel it radiating through his plating, back towards its source.

If he could acclimate-- however poorly-- to the cold, could he then reacclimate to this? He wanted to. Sinnoh above he wanted to.

“Acceptable. For now.” Emmet decided, and pulled away to poke his nose out of the den. Ingo wasn’t entirely sure what he expected to find there, considering they’d spent the daylight hours in a monochrome huddle, but didn’t stop him.

The chill was still present, but his face felt warm and flushed, at complete odds with it-- like the cold air was settling on his scales and evaporating on contact. Good riddance, he couldn’t help but think. All these years of building up snow, and he wouldn’t stand for another moment of it.

Somewhere in him, the glacier still lingered, but its days were numbered. With time, it would slowly melt into nothing.

...maybe Emmet was right.

A few centuries curled into ball of opposites sounded pretty good.

That he bore them now was a cold comfort. Any color would have been awful soaked in blood, but the contrasting hue served only as a reminder of how horribly he’d failed today-- both in service as a Depot Agent and as a brother. Emmet had been hurt and he’d just stood there, uncomprehending. His twin was bleeding out, and all he could do was clutch at his form in the vain hope that, somehow, this might help.

Blood seeped between his gloved fingers, the pressure doing absolutely nothing to stem its flow. Unwilling to let go, Ingo shifted to grab the glove from his opposite hand-- angling Emmet’s face against his neck in the process-- and pressed it to site; the white fabric immediately soaked through, but he he kept it in place, hoping it might make some kind of difference.

A sob began to work its way up his throat and, furious with himself, Ingo fought it down. Not now. Not now. What kind of good would that do? Who would it help? Nobody. Nobody at all. It wouldn’t help his brother, it wouldn’t help the other attendants or the passengers who’d been scared half to death, it wouldn’t even help him. If there was a chance to assist and he missed it because he was busy panicking, he’d never forgive himself.

The logical part of him reasoned that there wouldn’t be any such opportunity; this amount of blood loss couldn’t be overcome. No matter how many ways he tried to staunch it, the damage had already been done.

The part of him that had wanted to cry in the first place told that logical part, in no uncertain terms, to shut the fuck up.

Ultimately, Ingo ignored both lines of thought in favor of keeping the hold stable and reaching up with his free hand to steady his brother’s head; it was around that point that he realized the shallow puffs of breath against his neck were growing weaker and weaker. Frantic, but trying not to cause any more harm, he cast his gaze across the cab and futilely called for help. It wouldn’t do any good. Their other coworkers were busy keeping the aggressor from causing further harm or had already rushed off to find the onboard medic, and any passengers had wisely been guided to another car. The only one there to hear his appeal was his dying twin.

Seconds passed without another inhalation, and then a full minute. Ingo’s hand fled from the slowing well of blood, idling, useless over Emmet’s chest for far too long, and then to his face. There was no sense in looking for something that wasn’t there, and he forewent the cursory check entirely, moving straight to repositioning his brother and trying to clear the airway.

It didn’t work.

As Ingo tried everything his scrambled thoughts brought him, the minutes ticked by without response until, finally, he was forced to admit defeat. There was nothing more to be done. Emmet was gone.

The howl he’d swallowed worked its way free and, heedless of the blood covering both of their persons, Ingo buried his face in his twin’s shoulder. Maybe it was meant to muffle the bone deep grief, maybe it was one last desperate grasp-- that the roar might somehow kick start a heart gone still. Either effort was equally useless.

Without meaning to, he tightened his grip past the point that Emmet preferred. There was no protest, of course, no outraged squeak of dissent as he tried to extricate himself from the hold. Dragons, Ingo was going to miss it. Immediately, dozens of quirks and nuances sprung to mind, none of which he’d ever see again. He’d never known a life without them. He was unable to envision one.

The warmth hadn’t left his brother’s form yet, and Ingo wasn’t sure if it would be better to hold on and feel it seep away or force himself to let go and begin the distancing process. As if the thought itself was a threat, his fingers dug into the stained green fabric and his arms locked in place, refusing to yield. He might have had more to think on the matter, if not for the strangled outcry against his jaw.

“Ingo. Too! Tight!”

Unfortunately, this year had proven to be the exception to the rule.

The frigid temperatures did nothing to impact the city’s infrastructure; the rails operated as they always had, diligent maintenance keeping them perfectly on-schedule even as people stumbled in their attempts not to fall behind. Even when the snow began to build up, everything went perfectly according to the itinerary-- in terms of mechanics, at least.

It was a credit to Gear Station’s staff that, even on the first day of abnormal weather conditions, not a single Depot Agent ran late; as a matter of fact, most of them arrived early-- if just barely-- clearly trying to mitigate any difficulties they might find on their commute. The Agents really were a credit to the field, and it was thanks to them, in no small part, that the system ran as smoothly as it did.

The bosses fared somewhat differently.

The first few days had been amusing enough. Anticipating a more dramatic temperature drop, Ingo meant to ensure a comfortable trip to the station by adding a number of extra articles; Emmet had promptly reminded him that in spite of the snow, this was still Nimbasa, not the Icelands, and refused all but the thick grey scarf. Neither of them judged with complete accuracy, though, and it was with a begrudging concession that the younger accepted his brother’s unneeded cardigan on the way home that evening.

Even as the slush piled up, things were… manageable. Emmet tried without success to figure out how Ingo was traversing the snowdrifts and not soaking his pant legs or falling flat on his face, and was teasingly offered Sneasler’s services if he found the task so difficult. Sneasler herself was having a grand time tearing through the ice; it wasn’t every day she got to put her claws to good use without leaving the city, considering that the towering buildings were off limits.

All in all, things would have been okay if they’d decided to take a different route that morning. The one they favored was late to be cleared of ice, and the repeated snowfall meant that a great deal of it remained even after the fact. It made perfect sense that cold-dwelling Pokemon would be drawn to the area.

It was just… it was just a Vanillite. Its swirling, crystal studded head barely poked out of the den it had carved into a buildup of ice, and it didn’t pay a lick of attention as they approached, but as soon as he noticed it, Ingo stopped cold.

Emmet made it another two paces before realizing his footfalls weren’t being echoed.

He forced an uncertain laugh, looking between the two. “It thinks it is hiding. We shouldn’t ruin its fun.”

Without tearing his gaze away from the Pokemon, Ingo took a step backwards; unthinkingly, Emmet turned and made up that distance.

Another step.

When Emmet reached out and made to follow, about to ask what was wrong, Ingo’s eyes snapped to him instead of the Vanillite. Wide and glassy, it would be a lie to say there wasn’t recognition in them, but it was the… the wrong kind of recognition. Like he knew whatever he was looking at, and it wasn’t his twin. He flinched away from the extended hand, taking another few backwards steps, but his haste negated any experience with icy pathways and he slipped.

Instinctively, Emmet lunged forward, trying to steady him, but wasn’t able to process what was happening soon enough, and his brother hit the pavement with a painful sounding thump-- not that one would be able to tell by looking at Ingo. He didn’t so much as flinch at the impact, sight line unbroken but for the arms he’d tossed up to protect his face.

Emmet picked up the slack and winced. Somewhere ahead of them, where their path had yet to follow, there was a minor avalanche and a “Sne?”

Neither of them moved for a long moment, and by the time Emmet decided to try inching backwards, he realized he could hear running footsteps drawing nearer. Sneasler spared the both of them a single, puzzled look before her expression eased and she warbled in amusement; she cut in without a trace of doubt, moving to pull her human back to his feet.

Ingo allowed it, to an extent. She got him upright, at least, but he refused to let her touch his left arm, holding it close to himself as if to avoid jostling it. He couldn’t have injured it in the fall-- he’d immediately thrown both arms over his face when he’d slipped-- so then why…?

The Vanillite gave a frightened keen and plunged itself into another, more defensible snowbank. A heartbeat after it emerged, but before it reached safety, Ingo turned in full and fled the way they’d come.

Sneasler immediately gave chase, followed at something of a distance as Emmet fought the terrain. Part of him questioned how much this could possibly help, given that their presence had clearly been a source of upset, but it was balanced by the equally valid point that they couldn’t just let Ingo rush through the city streets in this state.

His lungs burned by the time he finally caught up, the cold, dry air ripping right through his ill-prepared system, but when a cough sounded, he wasn’t its origin. The coughing turned into a retch and, while unpleasant for everyone involved, it suggested there wouldn’t be another pursuit in their near future.

Emmet gasped in a cutting breath and leaned against one of the buildings they’d stopped between, trying simultaneously to understand and regain his composure.

The Vanillite had been the unwitting catalyst, that much was clear, but it wasn’t one of the species that Unova and Hisui had shared in common, was it? It didn’t make sense for it to evoke such a strong reaction. So what was really going on?

Minutes slipped by, and when Emmet was reasonably sure he could speak without the words coming out in a wretched wheeze, he called, shakily, to his brother. There was a long hesitation and then a raised hand, half blocked behind Sneasler’s bulk.

For lack of anything more astute, he asked, “...can I come over?”

In a single, jerky motion, Ingo flicked his wrist, signaling a go ahead.

His head was angled toward the ice-encrusted ground when Emmet skirted past Sneasler, eyes shut tight. With a clear line of sight, it was possible to put one of the mysteries to rest, at least.

He’d had a panic attack-- was having a panic attack. That much… that much, Emmet could assist with.

Keeping his voice steady and his sentence structure simple was easy. Be receptive. Be predictable. Under normal circumstances, he would have set a breathing pace himself, but between being ever-so-slightly winded and not wanting to risk touch right now, settled for leading a slow count instead.

Eventually, Ingo stopped shaking, but didn’t look up or open his eyes. That was fine. Looking back at what had happened, it seemed increasingly likely that whatever he’d seen hadn’t matched up to reality-- if not where the Vanillite was concerned, then with Emmet, at least-- and if the absence of visual stimulus helped, Emmet wasn’t going to argue.

Sneasler chirped, anxious, and butted her head against his shoulder.

“Looked like-- Zorua.” Ingo signed after an indeterminate amount of time had passed.

Oh.

Well.

...shit.

That explained his response to seeing Emmet above him, at least, and if he’d mistaken his brother for the Zoroark that had attacked him so long ago, the rest fell easily into place-- the desperation to get away, the cradled arm, the hesitant response to Sneasler.

It also made it nigh impossible for Emmet to offer any meaningful assistance, but maybe…

Already ruing what he was about to do, Emmet deposited his hat over Sneasler’s right ear and slipped out of his coat. He gave it two quick folds, its inner lining facing outward, and promptly buried his hands in it.

“We need to get you home immediately.” He said carefully, kneeling down so they were at the same level, “Can you stand?”

There was a terse nod and, still looking resolutely away, Ingo pushed himself upright. Emmet stepped into place on his opposite side. Sneasler padded along behind them.

The walk home was a silent one.

He had vague memories of waking up with the breath being crushed out of him, of flailing his way to freedom ready to berate his brother for the tight grip, and of the reproachful words dying on his tongue before he could speak them. The memory became clearer as he’d focused on his twin’s face, blood smeared across one cheek with tear tracks cleaving through it, looking like he’d seen a ghost who didn’t double as a light fixture.

It was with perfect clarity that he remembered starting upright and pawing at Ingo’s uniform, trying wildly to figure out what had happened-- where he was hurt and how to put things right-- stilling only when his twin took his face between bloodied hands and stared in something approaching awe. He hadn’t seemed to know whether to collapse against Emmet or trap him against his chest again, and had ended up freezing where he’d sat, taking back one hand to hide behind as his form heaved with stifled sobs.

Though Emmet had no way to recall those moments in which Ingo had gathered him up and let his limp head rest against a shoulder, he subconsciously mirrored it now. His twin drawn close, he could hear the labored breathing begin to falter, and forced himself to remain calm.

This could go down one of two tracks, and while he believed with his whole heart that they would be alright upon reaching the next station, he was currently staring down his greatest fear:

He had ridden alongside death, and they had departed at separate stops, but Emmet was horribly, horribly worried that Ingo wouldn’t be afforded that same grace. Since the day he’d failed to arrive at a final terminal, the thought had lingered in the back of his mind-- what was he supposed to do if they were so permanently separated? Emmet quite literally did not know life before his brother, and the thought that he might be left indefinitely as half of a whole was terrifying.

A feeble wheeze roused him from his spiral, and he carefully smoothed the hair away from where it stuck to Ingo’s face. It wasn’t what he’d hoped for when he’d finally made it to Hisui, but if this was it, it… would be enough? That was a ridiculous thought. It wouldn’t be enough, but it would have to be. Cloistered away in the back of the Pearl Clan’s medical tent, he’d taken every fleeting moment of consciousness to assure his twin that he wasn’t alone anymore, that, even torn apart, he’d been so immeasurably loved, that it would be okay, it would stop hurting soon.

There was no denying the fact that Ingo would die within the day. If his fate weren’t so uncertain, it might have been comforting-- one way or another, the poison-that-wasn’t-a-poison destroying his body would be forced to halt in its tracks. That he was sleeping now was a mercy, and if that clemency held out, he would still be asleep when his heart stopped.

The wound that had taken Emmet’s life was a blur at best, but it hadn’t so much as twinged when he’d rejoined the living world. Maybe he’d been distracted by his belief that the blood covering the both of them was Ingo’s, but that assumption had to have started somewhere, didn’t it? He hadn’t noticed that he’d been injured in the first place, and hadn’t been injured upon regaining consciousness, so when-- when-- Ingo woke back up, he logically wouldn’t be in any pain either.

One whistling breath wound down. There wasn’t another waiting beyond it.

Half out of sympathy and half from nerves, Emmet also held his breath.

He didn’t know how long he’d been dead. He’d never been that curious, and had known asking would disturb Ingo far more than the detail was worth, so Emmet had been content to leave it a mystery. While hindsight didn’t exactly make him regret the decision, the data would have been nice to have as a point of reference.

His heart pounded loud enough for the both of them as the minutes ticked by. In a morbid way, it made sense that the only time he’d ever been able to eclipse Ingo in volume was when his twin was quiet as the grave. When they were both awake and on the same playing field, he’d try harder-- he’d make it a proper competition. They had the same lungs; there was no reason that Ingo should possess the inherent ability to drown him out. He just had to believe that he’d get the opportunity to prove it.

Once Emmet could no longer bear the silence, he buried his face into the crook of his brother’s neck and told him that that was enough. It was time to wake up, now.

Ingo ignored him, but did helpfully snore against the top of his head.

Emmet didn’t consider himself a vindictive man. At no point in this process did he think to himself, ‘I hated waking up in a human vise grip, so I’d better pay it forward,’ but his arms hadn’t seemed to receive that bulletin. The next wheeze to reach him wasn’t a painful gasp for air, but a somewhat more comical, “’met. Can’tbreathe.”

Hm. What a conundrum. Someone really ought to do something about that.

Not Emmet, though. He was far too busy to even consider it.

There was a light bonk against his skull and, reluctantly, he relaxed his grip.

“You’re awake.” He said, and moved to retaliate.

 He caught a flash of upturned lips before their foreheads knocked together.

“I’m awake.” Ingo agreed, voice just shy of indulgent.

“I found you.”

“You found me.”

“I--” Voice cracking, Emmet gave a low keen, closing his eyes and collapsing forward. He’d been so scared, so scared, and now that the danger had passed, he wasn’t entirely what to do with the grief waiting in the wings. His breathing shuddered, and a warm, consoling hand laid over the back of his neck.

Finally, he gathered the willpower to gasp out, “I missed you.”

The day he’d died, Emmet lost one fear and gained another.

Today, he’d faced it and found another, smaller fear hiding beneath.

“I missed you.”

Never mind. His concern had been addressed.

Hisui had better watch out, because Emmet was officially fearless.

The poor thing had been running on nothing but adrenaline and determination, collapsing at the first sign of a compassionate claw.

Without her basket, Sneasler’s only recourse was to scoop the human up and run the both of them to safety, but that could mean two very different things. Palkia’s pack would know how to help, but she couldn’t smell them on this one’s pelt; if he didn’t belong to them, the odds that they would accept him were staggeringly low. Conversely, she was in charge of her own den and wouldn’t turn the human away, but his species was so much more fragile than Pokemon were. While she could lend a safe space, there was no guarantee that she would know how to mend what was broken.

The winds whipped around her, ruffling her fur intensely, and the human in her arms gave a pitiful shudder. She didn’t have time to stand around weighing her options; the storm would blow in before she knew it, and while she could weather it if need be, the human would not. Resolute, Sneasler chose a direction and began her trek. She didn’t allow herself the luxury a second thought.

If she could get him through the blizzard, she could attempt to sway the pack; her care wouldn’t be perfect, but she could keep a single human alive for a few days. For now, her priority had to be getting them to her den.

To Sneasler’s immense annoyance, the human’s trembling didn’t stop. It made holding onto him more difficult than it needed to be, and, in turn, forced her to clutch him more tightly to herself. So close to her face, she couldn’t help but sort through the scents that clung to him, and her conclusion was… anything but conclusive.

Some scents, she recognized-- ghostly flame, iron and an overwhelming abundance of frost, among others-- but some were utterly alien to her senses. There was also the undeniable smell of other humans, though nothing like those of Dialga or Palkia’s packs, or even those few stupid enough to wander alone.

By the time she stepped foot in her den, she’d learned something new: the human wasn’t shaking to spite her, he was cold. She didn’t know what he’d expected, traversing the Icelands with such a flimsy hide, but the act of holding him steady against her chest had seemed to help, and she wasn’t arguing with results.

Half-dead on her feet from the increasingly treacherous journey, she’d wasted no time in dragging him to her nest and curling up, purposefully resting her head atop her guest. If it worked to keep a wily kit pinned, it would work here; the physical contact had already done him some good.

The strange smells lingered in her nose and on her palate when she parted her jaws to scent him one more time, but made no more sense than they had over the course of their trip. Whatever. She would deal with that in the morning.

---

When she’d first chosen her den as the lesser of two dangers, Sneasler had been grateful that her nest was empty. This was primarily because she didn’t have to split her attention between an injured human and a clowder, but the two separate parties had also been a concern; if there were no kits, she didn’t have to worry that they might harm the human, or vise-versa.

Even if there had been any Sneasel lingering in her nest, she was beginning to think that wouldn’t have been a problem. The human was incredibly docile. It could have been the persisting injury, but he hadn’t tried to dislodge her once over the course of the night, and accepted her every action without complaint. Granted, she had to convince him that, when she handed him a berry, it was meant for him to eat and not hold like a particularly ambitious Sudowoodo, but he was beginning to cotton on faster.

Outside, the blizzard raged; she’d barely headed it off when she’d returned the previous night, which meant there was little choice but to wait it out in here with her denfellow. It could have been worse, Sneasler guessed. It wouldn’t be the first time she’d taken in a stray at the last moment, and would only last a short spell.

After only a day, the smell of her nest already hewed to the human’s hide; he would reek of it by the time the storm lessened. Would it help the pack accept him? They liked her, and she’d taken this one in. That had to count for something, didn’t it?

Oh, she hated pack politics-- they never made any sense. Rather than entertain its absurdity a moment longer, she flopped forward into her nest and buried her nose into the fur of her arms. Distantly, she was aware of the human shuffling nearer and not even trying to be quiet about it, but that was a minor point of interest.

He idled at her right side and, after some deliberation, gently rested a hand along her upper arm. Her head snapped up and, instinctively, he leaned away from the sudden movement, but reassumed his stance a moment later. She could have yowled in frustration as he offered her the sitrus berry she’d pressed into his grasp some time ago, but didn’t get the chance as he set it down and, with a questioning note, raised a hand to the side of her face, waiting.

She stared for a few seconds and then huffed for him to go ahead and do whatever he wanted. Even if he intended to be, he wasn’t a threat; he was a hurt human with nothing but the pelt on his back, and she was one of Arceus’ blessed. What was he going to do? Shiver her to death?

The hand that connected with her had none of the velocity of a Force Palm, but a similar paralytic quality. There was a surprising ease in the way his fingers worked into the thick fur of her cheek, and while a human’s claws were kind of pathetic, they were ideal for this application; the dull scrape through her undercoat was… really nice. Without meaning to, she felt her vocal chords rumble in appreciation, and didn’t bother to silence herself.

Eventually, Sneasler decided to lean into it and pushed herself forward, resting her great head on his lap. If she had to be stuck here with a human, at least it was one who knew how to show his gratitude.

They would still have to work on the berry thing, though.

---

In time, Sneasler decided that she liked the human. When the storm ended, she sought Palkia’s pack out, but didn’t surrender him to them. It was just as well-- she could smell the distrust, and knew he’d be safer with her. The young leader, at least, was worth the head on her shoulders, and bowed to Sneasler’s demands; by the next morning, a human stinking of bitter herbs turned him back over to her, his fragile skin patched with white bits and one arm lashed against his chest.

He smelled vaguely like the pack, now. Enough to confirm that he’d never had any meaningful contact with them prior to this. There was also the astringent tang of vivichoke cut with bugwort, and it was disgusting; Sneasler tracked the worst of it to his head, where someone had shorn the fur hidden beneath his crest in order to apply more of the white. She didn’t pretend to understand.

The contact had been brief, and the foreign scents faded quickly. As the smell of his pelt began to thin, the other humans’ fading one by one, Sneasler came to a troubling realization: he’d clearly been part of his own pack, and she hadn’t caught any of their scents in all this time.

Occasionally, humans broke away to live on their own, but this one didn’t have the nature for it. Too friendly. Too social. Even though the other humans had rebuffed him, he’d still made the effort to reach out. The only other option, though, was that he’d been cast out, and that just… didn’t make sense. The problem was that he was so friendly and even tempered. What self respecting pack didn’t value those qualities?

There had been a lot of scents clinging to him, originally-- more than the handful of close ties humans tended to maintain, but most of them were distant. It had been a little bit like the young leader, actually, whose duty to the other humans could be sensed in their lingering essence.

Maybe… maybe that was it. Sociability and composure were ideal traits, excellent for keeping the peace. If her human had held a leadership position, it was possible he’d been usurped and thrown to the elements, and she doubted he would have fought back. It would explain why she hadn’t caught so much of a whiff of the other humans along the peaks, in spite of their undeniable presence on this one.

Fine. It didn’t matter, anyway, because he was hers now. Her scent was the strongest on his pelt, and she’d put a great deal of effort into covering up the bugwort stench. If he wanted to smell like fire or iron, too, that was up to him, but nobody with a nose would be able to mistake who he belonged to.

Slowly, even the most ingrained of the human scents began to wear away from his hide, but Sneasler wouldn’t forget them.

---

With an ease she should have expected, the human found a pack amongst Pokemon and, begrudgingly, Sneasler accepted that she had to share. The young leader, as the single voice of reason in Palkia’s pack, allowed her human to become her warden. Sneasler never let Gligar hear the end of it.

Time passed. She fostered a litter and watched them grow. Gliscor evolved and wouldn’t let Sneasler hear the end of it. Her warden revealed a delightfully stubborn streak and immediately leveled it against the human from Dialga’s pack.

The sky broke, and was mended.

And one day, not even a season later, Sneasler caught wind of a scent she only vaguely knew-- the one that had been so thoroughly integrated into her warden’s pelt that she’d nearly mistaken it for part of his own.

She didn’t approach, but when she founds its source, she watched. She listened. She scented.

There were more smells that she didn’t recognize, but everything she’d bothered to put to memory was there on the new human’s hide. And oh, wasn’t it interesting that this one wore the same crest that hers did, the same arm marking, the same stripe around the neck.

The young leader had adornments on her head, arms and neck. So, too, had her predecessor.

How dare this one encroach on her territory? Were they looking to undermine her warden once more? To remove him as a threat to their leadership? If they wanted control of their pack so badly, she would send them back to it-- but they would not, under any circumstances, hurt her warden again.

And if they tried it, they would have to weather her.

Confusion was very, very good for that purpose.

Ghetsis knew the score, knew how effective a solution it had been in the past, and if he could get one solid hit in, was certain he could get an advantage over the so-called Countertype Conductors; they wouldn’t get in his way if they were too busy trying to figure out which of them was which, and by the time they recovered enough to think straight, he’d have already secured his victory.

That had been the plan, at least. When he managed to trip up the pyrokinetic one long enough to put it into action, though, things began to go wildly off script.

There was a moment where everything looked perfectly fine, and he’d advanced on the agent in white, eager to deal with the most prominent threat first. Even if the other managed to put two brain cells together early, the facility’s arid nature would prevent him from fully utilizing the hydrokinesis he was famous for, forcing use of a less honed psychic ability.

Or so Ghetsis had assumed. As he loomed over the lighter twin, however, a prickle began at the base of his neck, rapidly becoming the burn of psychic energy. His robes whirled around him as he turned, backing up to escape the fiery radius.

That was completely impossible. The other agent wasn’t capable of using pyrokinesis. His people had watched for months and he’d never shown an ounce of affinity for it-- had never even tried to use it in the middle of the arctic.

The agent in black advanced on him, lips quirking up into a dangerous grin, but the dazed fog remained settled over his eyes. He’d still been affected, then-- just as he should’ve been, once his brother was hit-- and hadn’t managed to recover in such a short window. So then what--?

A dome of fire roared to life half a centimeter from his nose. He stepped back, as any reasonable man would, and readied himself. The aggressor crossed the temporary field of safety to his partner, who remained unsinged by way of their mental connection, and urgently called a name.

The wrong name.

That was it, then. While the one in black should have been the hydrokinetic, the wires had gotten crossed mid-fight; somehow, instead of scrambling their abomination of a mental world into a useless mess, the confusion had swapped one twin’s mind for the other.

It had to be a fluke; in all their months of examination, the application of confusion had never produced a result like this. He readied another measure of confusion gas as black-turned-white pulled white-turned-black to his feet, but threw it a moment too soon. White coat’s head snapped up as the lingering fire consumed the attack, and his scowl drew deeper.

As the last of the protective field burnt away, they started toward Ghetsis in lock-step, elbows linking together. It made for an easy target and he tried again, careful to maintain the distance between them and keep a steady head in spite of the complication.

The confusion landed. He knew for a fact that it did. They weren’t even trying to sidestep the psychohazardous fog that lay before them-- but neither so much as blinked as they kept their pace, focused on him and him alone.

In unison, their interlocked arms raised, obscuring the contrasting curve of lips.

A worrying flash of heat passed over him, or-- or maybe it was cold?

To his horror, Ghetsis found he could no longer tell the difference.

It likely had to do with the fact that gashes in his palm were also deeper than anything he’d experienced prior, but that was far from the only factor involved. The water tipped over the cuts had been breathtakingly cold, even from the first few seconds, and repeatedly applied to wash any contaminates out. While he’d called the solution that followed antiseptic, it was something of an exaggeration; surely it had been refined to fill the purpose, but it didn’t have that distinctive sterile scent, and instead left a lingering pungency. He had no doubt that it was doing its job, though, because it certainly burned like a proper antiseptic, and he locked his elbows into his sides to resist the urge to flap his hands and dull the sting.

At the motion, Ingo looked up, judging what was going on, and turned back to his work.

“The burning sensation should die down.” He said plainly, “If it does continue to hurt, however, inform me posthaste; I have a persim balm that can numb the area.”

Bizarre. It was absolutely bizarre to watch. They were conductors-- and Depot Agents before that-- so of course they had some measure of medical training, but most of it only went so far as to stabilizing the affected party until professionals could arrive at the scene. He couldn’t speak for his brother, but the most Emmet had ever had to use it-- apart from treating small scrapes and cuts that happened from time to time-- had been assisting a passenger who’d gone into anaphylaxis upon departing their train.

This went beyond that. It was one thing to be able to pull medicine off of a pharmacy shelf and follow its instructions; it was another entirely to pick over unlabeled jars and confidently apply them in order.

Emmet understood that it was in good practice, but… out here? He had no qualm with the fact that Wardens cared for the territory and those who dwelt within, but the only others out here were Pokemon and that Diamond snob. This wasn’t the kind of medical attention you paid to Pokemon-- Emmet knew for a fact the potions his brother kept for that purpose were stored elsewhere entirely, having been offered access-- and he somewhat doubted pretty boy would humor it, even if the alternative was death.

Maybe the Galaxy people needed help here and there, but they seemed relatively self sufficient. And insular.

It was a running theme, Emmet had noticed; it seemed everyone needed a reason to help another person. That mindset was so incredibly far removed from everything he’d grown up with-- everything they’d grown up with. The world was a dangerous place, but inhabited by people and Pokemon who made it worth braving.

Hence the claw marks that tore through his palms and down his forearm. They were worth it, so long as that Yanma had been spared the Luxray’s ire.

A thin, slimy, vaguely green substance was spread over the cuts; a far cry from the uniform ointments back home, it had been imperfectly blended by a human hand. Emmet hated the way the red showed through the green tint, and turned his attention to the collection of bottles and jars littering the tent’s floor. There was a sympathetic hum in front of him, but Ingo didn’t look up from where he was gauging a length of bandage.

The silence that had settled over them wasn’t an uncomfortable one, it was just the natural conclusion of two people existing in the same space, focused on different things. Or, well… focused on the same thing, from different perspectives. As much as he disliked the green-whatever-it-was, Emmet quickly found his eyes drawn to the motion of bandages winding around his hand, and then down his arm. Specifically, he was distracted by the odd combination of experienced wrapping and sudden hesitation.

Almost absently, as he tucked the end into the weave, Ingo said, “That was easier than I’d expected.”

“I take it your usual patients try to poison you at some point in the process.”

His brother snorted, but didn’t deny it, moving onto the remaining palm. Strangely, Ingo hit the exact same stumbling block here as well, in the angle of the wrist. He must not have had that much practice with it-- and understandably so. Emmet notwithstanding, who out in the mountains had a wrist that would need wrapping?

Minor foible aside, it only took a few minutes for him to finish treating the hand, and, after testing the bandage’s compression, he deemed the job acceptable. There was a pop from some joint or other as he straightened up, but he paid it no heed.

“Now then,” Ingo said, settling his armful of jars and fixing Emmet with an amused look, “Would you like a pinap berry for being such a brave Sneasel?”

---

They repeated the process the next day; the only variation, at first, was a slightly more confident approach to wrists. Ingo was convinced that the cuts looked right for this stage of healing, and, lacking any real knowledge on the subject, Emmet was inclined to believe him.

It took a slightly different turn as his brother sat back on his haunches, away from the bed Emmet had been perched on, and told him he was free to go. Notably, he hadn’t gathered the jars up, or made any motion to put the various materials away.

Emmet obeyed, stepping past the setup, but didn’t leave the tent. Instead, he idled near the small area set aside for crafting, careful not to knock over the leeks resting on its surface.

Ingo didn’t pay him any attention, shuffling loose from his coat and the Pearl Clan tunic, then working his left arm free of the dark undershirt. That made sense, then; there was no point in putting the supplies away if he had further use for them. But wouldn’t he need help? He may have been working with his dominant hand, but he’d still be short one.

The thought didn’t seem to occur to the older twin, who took his scissors back up and angled them beneath the bandage winding around his bicep. Before even trying to slice through, he dipped his head and took the tied-off excess between his teeth, pulling taut, and easily cut it away. The wound it slowly uncovered didn’t look great, but even Emmet’s inexpert medical know-how told him that it was just part of the healing process, neither freshly inflicted nor entirely mended.

More than that, though, he got caught on the fact that this was routine. There was no confusion in what to do first or hesitation in the motions; Ingo hadn’t even bothered to test the bandage before leaning toward the scissors’ blade. He was used to this.

Emmet, himself, had observed that nobody lingered around Mt. Coronet seeking first aid-- and by the same stroke, there would be no one to assist in a medical emergency. You had to take care of it for yourself. This wasn’t a skill Ingo had developed as part of a Warden’s duties, was it? It was just a basic part of survival in Hisui’s wilderness.

The procedure of washing and then disinfecting went exactly as it had with Emmet’s array of wounds, but wasn’t immediately followed by the green slime. Instead, Ingo’s hands gravitated toward a separate jar-- the contents of which he’d actually created only a few days prior. There was pecha in it-- Emmet remembered that much-- and some leek juice, he thought. The two ingredients hadn’t belonged anywhere near each other in a culinary sense, but it tracked that someone who dealt with poison types so regularly would know how to mix a general purpose antivenom.

That it was being applied now suggested one such creature had been the cut’s source. Shock of shocks.

When Ingo put it away and moved onto the jar of goop, Emmet moved closer, earning himself a sideways look. The same way he’d watched the bandages wind around his palms, he watched the process of this wound being wrapped, and found none of the indecision, no awkward angles or uncertainty what to do with-- as it turned out-- an extra hand. Ever so slightly, he nodded to himself, and knelt down as the remaining bandage dwindled to the point where it had to be tied off.

“Here,” He said gently, reaching over to take the material just below where his twin held it pinned, “Let me.”

In several smooth motions, he cinched the bandage and tied it into a knot. When he pulled away, Ingo reached over and plucked at the topmost layer, then moved his arm this way and that, testing it. He glanced briefly to Emmet, then away, bemused, and with a quick word of thanks, moved to clear the supplies away.

There was an odd edge to the silence this time-- not tense, but… flustered, taken off guard. Once he’d pulled his coat back on, Ingo put the jars away one after another; his lips parted as if to say something, but he seemed to think better of it.

Eventually, though, he ran out of excuses and was forced to face the tent at large. It was alright. Apparently he’d bought himself enough time to pool his wits.

“Thank you,” He said again, properly, but still awkward in an endearing sort of way, “That was… far easier than I’d expected.”

“I am happy to assist.” Emmet said as a promise.

He took something from one pocket and offered it without opening his thickly-bandaged hand; perhaps there was some glimpse into the past that caused Ingo to hesitate, or maybe it was just an inherent part of interacting with one’s sibling. After a second, he relented and held his own palm up to accept it.

“Verrrry good! Yup, bashful Sneasels get a sitrus berry!”

When he was asked to conceptualize space, as part of a Pearl Clan custom, he’d described it as a challenge-- a distance that was meant to be crossed. Something deep down said that traveling from one point to another shouldn’t have been an ordeal, that it was meant to be safe and swift, so perhaps that view came from the culture he’d forgotten. Here in Hisui, where the landscape was neither of those things and transit was accomplished on foot or via Pokemon, there was merit in putting such emphasis on the space itself.

Maintaining an area of safety was a practical exercise; it paid to be aware of one’s surroundings when anything could be lurking behind the next crag or bush.

What Ingo struggled with was the way it translated into the Pearl Clan’s culture. People who had purportedly known each other for decades left three Bidoofs’ gap between them, and even family members staunchly stood separate from one another. There were precious few exceptions, and that was often mandated by age, illness or injury.

Amongst the members of the Pearl Clan, there was a great deal to be said with distance instead of words, and there was little mistaking the purposeful length he was kept at: he was a stranger, a threat, unwelcome in the radius of safety the clansmen observed.

He tried not to take it personally; he was an unknown, after all, which was all but synonymous with risk. A blunt voice somewhere in him thought it was a bullshit coping mechanism on everyone’s parts, but mostly the Pearls’. He’d been here two seasons, walking on eggshells all that time, and without change; that wasn’t reasonable caution, it was paranoia.

Irida, at least, trusted him enough to stand within arm’s reach, and he deeply appreciated that. It didn’t matter that she was just one individual; he was grateful to be treated as a person instead of a raging alpha.

The first true deviation, however, arrived in the form of the Galaxy Team’s skyfaller.

Wayward Cave was treacherous without light. While traversable, he was loathe to lose the girl in the tunnel system, where she might run afoul any number of aggressive Pokemon, and so he’d asked her to stay close, to keep herself coupled. His intention had been to speak as he wove a path through the cavern, loud enough for her to follow, but deliberately curbing the volume he so easily fell into.

Instead, as they stepped away from the singular source of light, he heard her draw even, and a hand slipped into his.

Ingo felt himself flinch, and raised his free hand to his cap, trying to play it off. While he still resorted to his original plan, he spoke as a distraction for the both of them, and didn’t notice as it eased into vague reminiscing. Something about the left palm pressed against his right pierced deeper into his subconscious than he knew existed and, to his shame, he found himself frustrated that he had to focus elsewhere.

A phantom ache lingered long after Akari slipped her hand away, as though her touch had been a resonating Force Palm.

Somewhat belatedly, it occurred to him that that might have been the first time anyone had touched him in years without having reason to do so. He shook the thought off almost immediately. Of course she’d had reason; people didn’t just go around holding strangers’ hands unprompted. Clearly he hadn’t been straightforward enough in his plan to lead her with conversation, leaving her to find her own solution or be caught in the lurch.

But it kept happening-- small things, unprompted, ranging from their commute up the mountainside past the point of quelling the Nobles. At first, the contact lanced through him, highlighting how long it had been since anyone had drawn close enough to do so, but he adapted with a startling promptness.

Slowly, he began to reach out in turn, to fix her bandana or take her by the shoulder to correct her course.

So it was disheartening when she stopped apropos nothing.

Immediately, Ingo followed suit. As soon as he realized she was pulling away, he backed off in turn. She had to have had cause, and, as disappointing as this outcome was, it wasn’t his place to press; there were very few reasons he could produce off the top of his head, absolutely none of them good.

The reality, though, was far more innocent than he’d feared.

Akari approached him sheepishly one day, eyes downcast and hands locked together.

“I’m… really sorry, Ingo,” She said, and, with a deep breath, forced herself to look up at him, “I’ve been seriously overstepping your boundaries, huh? I promise I didn’t know, I wouldn’t’ve--”

She made a frustrated noise in the back of her throat, and Ingo took that as the go-ahead to cut in.

“You’ve been informed of the Pearl Clan’s traditions, I take it?”

There was a long hesitation, “Calaba told me.”

He raised a hand there, showing her mercy, “Yes, well, there’s no need for us to dwell on that. While I can appreciate the pursuit of self-betterment, you know full well that my original station wasn’t with the Pearl Clan; what reason would you have to believe that I followed that particular custom?”

“You never reached out first,” She said almost instantly, “I thought back on it, and I was always the one who pushed. And yeah, you adjusted to it, but that really only makes it worse.”

“I agree, it does sound far worse when you phrase it that way.” He said, trying to convey through voice, if she wouldn’t hear the words, how little distress he felt in this matter, “If you must, it would be more accurate to say that I readjusted. Personally, I prefer to think of it as a reminder; my memory is… faulty, and it seems this was just something more that I’d lost.”

She looked unconvinced and, in demonstration, he reached over to lay a hand over hers, “I’m very grateful to have this back, Akari, and it makes me wonder if, perhaps, it’s not so hopelessly idealistic to believe I might still recover the rest of what I’ve lost. Please don’t be upset with yourself-- not on my behalf.”

For several seconds, Akari stared hard at the back of his hand.

“...you’re sure?”

He nodded, and she took her hand away. It might have been cause for concern had it not been followed by the way she crept forward, movements deliberate and yielding, telegraphing her intentions. It was a bit silly, he thought, but very sweet, demonstrating how seriously she was taking the matter.

She shuffled into place next to him, close, but just shy of touching. He huffed fondly and angled himself to correct that fact.

“I asked Irida, too.” Akari said after a long moment, “She said it was more about choice, and that a lot of the Pearl Clan wouldn’t be comfortable with an outsider so close, but you might not...”

“Lady Irida does know her clan.” He agreed mildly. “I like to believe it’s the reason she allows me so near.”

Akari’s eyes flickered up and then back down; she bent a leg at the knee and wrapped an arm around it, as if to distract herself from leaning in, “Outsiders, huh?”

The question was met with a resigned hum. Mirroring the consideration she’d showed him moments prior, Ingo eased an arm around her shoulders and, finally, she nestled against his side. The contact wasn’t the jolt it had originally been, but, after so long without, still buzzed under his skin.

He was beginning to understand. When a person fasted, any food became an alm; when they kept vigil, an idle moment was respite. If you purposefully distanced yourself from all others, touch did feel like something divine. Ingo didn’t know that he agreed with the implementation, but he could, at least, see his clanmates’ logic, now.

Space could be sacred, and so could time-- but, he thought, it was only by virtue of who you shared it with.

It was clear enough by his first week amongst the Pearl Clan that he must have worked with Pokemon in his otherwise empty past; he could handle tame Pokemon he’d never met before and cooperate with the more agreeable wild ones with only a little effort. He’d even-- rather unwittingly-- charmed the wildest of the wild, a fact he hadn’t even realized until Calaba’s flat, disbelieving, “What, in all of Sinnoh’s vast space, am I looking at?”

In his defense, he’d thought it was another one of the settlement’s Pokemon who’d walked up and plonked her head in his lap, seeking attention. He hadn’t been entirely incorrect, either; Sneasler was a Pearl Clan Pokemon, just one of more significance than he’d first known.

Wardens, at least, seemed to have more of a grasp on how Pokemon worked-- albeit with regards to their Nobles, and few species beyond. Palina had been a great source of insight, her own Noble’s child newer to the clan than Ingo himself, and Calaba’s years of experience had helped fill in the picture.

It still felt… lacking. Ingo was relatively certain that a good caretaker vetted a potential mate, checked for a number of qualities from demeanor to fighting capabilities, but the other Wardens seemed content to let their Nobles do as they would, and he didn’t want to step on any toes.

So when Sneasler had an empty nest one day and a clutch of solid-shelled eggs the next, something pinged as fundamentally incorrect, but he went with it. The Sneasel that hatched were as wily and energetic as their mother, so there was no arguing with results.

They went through two seasons of this before the ruse broke.

The running of paws across the Highlands-- be it by twos or fours-- wasn’t an uncommon sound, and the call from above, where Gliscor lazily circled, stated that Sneasler was inbound. There was a follow up, screech, however, sighting another-- one of the invasive Weavile. Ingo had to assume it was trying to move in on Sneasler’s territory, and moved to assist in driving it off. Just as one hand dropped to Machamp’s pokeball, however, he found his arms full of something else.

Without a chirp of explanation, Sneasler spun him around and shoved, chittering for him to leave right now. The more battle-hungry side of him argued against it, but the one cultivated by Hisui’s wilderness and Sneasler herself listened; nodding sharply, he darted off to find a haven in the mountain’s crags.

Only once he was hidden away in the shadow of a jagged cliff did he stop to consider that the object thrust into his hands was an egg. What… did that imply? Sneasler’s nest was currently vacant. Sneasel-- Hisuian and foreign alike-- were nest predators, so it seemed likely that the strange evolution would share that in common, but if they weren’t her eggs, why would Sneasler care? He could see the Noble getting jealous and stealing a snack from a rival, but not whatever production had just been acted out.

Was it hers? Had she been attacked in the midst of having a clutch? Well, no. That wasn’t possible-- not the way she’d torn down the mountain. They weren’t even on the right side of the cliffs to be near her den.

What in the world was going on?

The stone above his hiding spot cracked and tiny bits of rock rained down. Instinctively, Ingo flinched, and an upward glance gave him about half a second to prepare for Gliscor swooping into his face, tail hooked into the bluff so it could stare upside-down.

It clicked at him, and he raised a hand to cup the top of its head, absently moving to scratch behind one ear.

Several minutes passed and, eventually, Sneasler made her appearance, nudging Gliscor aside like a particularly enterprising curtain. She made a point of looking over him, ensuring both her Warden’s safety and that of the egg she’d entrusted to him, before reluctantly peeking up to meet him eye to eye.

Ingo said nothing; he tilted his head and turned a wrist in question. She wilted, if only just.

Somehow, in spite of her imposing claws, Sneasler made grabby paws at the egg. He sighed and turned it over for her to inspect more thoroughly, but she just wrapped her arms around it and sprinted off-- albeit at a pace he was clearly meant to follow. It was immediately obvious that she was headed toward her den, and so he opted for the more human-friendly cliff faces rather than the ones she saw fit to traverse, even with fragile cargo cradled in one arm.

To his bafflement, there were Pokemon eggs settled in her nest when they stepped in. There hadn’t been any there that morning, and, to the best of Ingo’s knowledge, Sneasler had been on the opposite side of the mountain all day. She set the egg down with the other three and clambered in, too, looking up.

“That’s not yours.” Ingo said plainly but, after another few seconds of being stared at, sighed and knelt down opposite her. “You rerouted all of these eggs from their proper stations, didn’t you?”

While mildly chiding, his tone was still gentle. Mostly, he just wanted to understand.

She tapped her chest with one paw and then to the nearest egg, shaking her head vigorously.

“You’re unable to have your own?”

There was another, more decisive shake of the head.

“You don’t… want your own?” Given the circumstance, it sounded ridiculous as soon as it left his mouth, but Sneasler’s eyes lit up and she nodded. A little helplessly, Ingo gestured to the bounty of stolen Sneasel-to-be that surrounded her, “Sneasler, that’s-- if you have no desire for your own Sneasel, why have you stolen them away?”

She glanced off to the side. At first, Ingo took it for something approaching shame, but her expression was all wrong. In was a pointed look, through the rock toward the center of the territory. When it failed to click, she looked back to him, and added the chirp that meant ‘Pearl Clan’.

Oh. Well… yes, that would make sense. One of a Warden’s duties was to help raise a Noble’s successor; that necessitated a number of sub-tasks like keeping track of the young, gauging their temperament and working with the Noble to ensure that the Lord-or-Lady-to-be understood what was needed from them. From step one, it presumed the Nobles would have-- would want-- heirs. That assumption had already led to near disaster in the case of Lord Arcanine.

Without quite meaning to, Ingo buried his face in his hands, but it was barely muffled as he said, “So you have been reallocating eggs that do not belong to you in order to appease the Pearl Clan.”

He didn’t see, but could hear the smug ‘aren’t-I-a-clever-one’ in the answering trill.

Ingo looked up by a matter of degrees, hands still steepled to cover his lower face, and fixed her with a stern look. “Is it too late to return these passengers to their rightful homes?”

The sheepish inclination of the head came as little surprise; anything that spent even a moment in Sneasler’s den came away with her scent clinging to it. Even if the eggs’ parents could tell it belonged to them, Sneasler’s lingering presence would likely keep them from accepting it again.

“Then we will care for them as usual, but I will not permit this to happen again.” It was silly to feel kinship with an egg of all things, but Ingo couldn’t help but sympathize with it; they’d been helpless to do anything as they were spirited away from a home they’d never remember, stolen from their parents and nestma--

He blinked, startled to awareness, as his the brim of his hat obscured his vision.

There was a fond whuffing noise from somewhere on its other side, and he had a sneaking suspicion as to who was responsible for both.

“Thank you,” He sighed, and reached to straighten his cap. How ridiculous, to find himself derailing over a few… forcefully adopted eggs. He still didn’t approve by any means, but the damage had been done, and now that he knew, he would see to its end the following year.

The question of how to put this right with regards to the Pearl Clan’s tradition remained. While he could uphold his ward’s ruse and act as though the Sneasel she’d raised were from the line that Sinnoh had blessed, he wasn’t sure that was the right thing to do. Under no circumstances would he encourage Sneasler to act in a way contrary to her desires, so there had to be another way...

Ruefully, he spared a thought for the state of Hisui’s Pokemon education. This was just a step removed from claiming that an egg ‘just appeared!’ to avoid having to explain where it came from.

...he hadn’t questioned it, had he? Sneasler’s previous clutches had ‘just appeared’, and he’d gone right along with it. Sinnoh above, he was a fool.

“I don’t understand, Sneasler.” Ingo said, and he could admit that he was trying to distract himself from the embarrassment of falling for something most 10 year olds questioned, “You’ve maintained this cover for years, and clearly you were able to fend off the Weavile on your own. My involvement seems unnecessary-- and forgive me for saying so, but I would even call it unwise.”

Sneasler huffed and grabbed him by either side of the collar. Something about that act seemed slightly to the left of what should have been, but he was more distracted by the fact that it sent him tumbling against the Noble. Through the worn padding of his hat, he felt her rest her head on his.

Two chirps sounded, rumbling through her chest.

Kit, was the first.

Mine said the second.

It sounded odd, imbalanced even, but it really wasn’t. Ingo was too fair-minded to chart an inequitable path, and Emmet had no compunctions about raising an objection if need be. If anything, it was a game of give and take, of compromises. It was a substantial part of how they had ended up running the Battle Subway.

There was exactly one place Ingo had ventured where Emmet had been unable to join him, but, as always, he’d split the difference. While Emmet still wished he’d been able to accompany his brother on the unplanned commute to Hisui, the fact that it had been a round trip lessened the sting.

It was a strange homecoming, but not a bad one. There was a lot that had to change to accommodate their new lives, and a lot to adjust to or reacquaint oneself with; that was just the nature of things when you or a loved one was reincarnated as a soul-powered train. For every weird or uncomfortable new quirk, there were ways to alleviate that burden or find the fun in it, and there were plenty of perks mixed in. It was life-- just a new spin on it.

From the day he’d figured out who, precisely, was haunting the subway tunnels, Emmet had set his course.

As always, he followed his twin’s lead. It just took a little longer this time.

That was a nice way of saying that, when he passed, he turned right back around and demanded to become a second Frightrail. He knew the drawbacks; he’d been right there to witness them for years on end. While he might not relish the idea of drawing sustenance from others’ life force, he’d come to terms with that reality. Having a completely different body type would be a learning experience, but was it so much worse than moving on without his brother? No.

When it came down to it, that was the answer to every tricky question. He could endure it. They could endure it as a--

...could they be a two car train if they were both trains? Did one’s existence as a literal train preclude their ability to be a metaphorical car?

The Powers That Were Trying His Nerves stared for a long moment, processing, and then decided to wash Its hooves of him. Or at least, he assumed that was what happened. Something had to have occurred, because he blinked and then everything looked wrong.

Well, maybe not wrong, but weird. Even before reaching up to scrub at the rounded snout changing his field of vision, Emmet understood why that was-- again, he’d put years of thought into this, even if he’d made his decision all but immediately-- it was just… a lot at once. At least he had the luxury of knowing what he’d been getting himself into. Having an older sibling was convenient like that.

Speaking of.

He stopped pawing at his steel-smooth nose and looked around. Seemed Arceus had seen fit to plonk him in the park across from the station. Truthfully, Emmet hadn’t expected anything in particular, so this destination made as much sense as anything else. While it would have lived up the classic image of a ghost to rise where he’d died, he really didn’t need that kind of drama in his afterlife; he’d passed at home, and, logically, that space belonged to someone else now.

...he should go haunt the tunnels, just to see how Ingo liked playing worm wrangler.

Emmet made to push himself upright, but only made it so far as the first set of arms, lacking any of the tertiary pairs that studded each segment of plating. Right, they stayed dormant by default, didn’t they? He knew the sections of his body could slide apart to bring them out, but how exactly did one go about doing that…?

Maybe he should have asked some more pointed questions when he’d had the opportunity.

Eventually, he gave up on the ghost limbs, but with some trial and error, managed to wriggle himself into the air, and that would do for now. He stayed lower to the ground than strictly necessary for a host of reasons, ranging from ‘less noticeable’ to ‘not as far to fall’ to ‘feels more train-like’.

He was well aware that there wouldn’t be anyone at Gear Station so early in the morning-- not since Jackie had retired-- but it was home station for a reason, perhaps now more than ever. Even if he couldn’t make the staff understand what he wanted, all he had to do was wait around and he’d get it.

It wound up somewhat easier than he’d expected; even with the late hour, the station master’s office was occupied.

Blatantly ignoring the yellowed sign asking that patrons ‘not tap the glass, because the station master was sleeping’, he nosed it open and barged right in. Then Emmet did something that, were he alive, would have gone against the very fabric of his moral code: he deliberately caused a collision of trains.

With a sleepy hiss, his victim cracked an eye open, then chuffed a yawn.

“How long has it been?” He asked, nudging insistently at his brother’s face, “Do not tell me you were asleep all this time.”

“’All this time’? I can make assumptions, too, you realize. You’ve been here… hm… seven minutes, and you’re already jumping to conclusions.” Ingo rumbled, amused. His voice was raspy with disuse, and he didn’t even bother opening his other eye. Combined, it told Emmet that yes, he’d been asleep for awhile.

Magnanimously, he decided to ignore the comment, “You taunted me for days, before. And this time you decided to take a nap?”

His twin finally resigned himself to consciousness and ducked under Emmet’s head, giving himself room to stretch the first set of arms. “I’ve told you, the circumstances were nerve-wracking; it only turned into a game because that was the track you chose.”

Emmet grumbled his malcontent, and, to his surprise, it echoed in his throat. Before he had the chance to fully process that fact, Ingo raised his head, bumping against his.

“I assisted for a time, but it wasn’t fun in your absence. This seemed the easiest solution.”

Oh, it was a matter of fun was it? He could work with that. Eyes darting this way and that, he picked a quarry and escape route. When Ingo seemed distracted untangling himself, Emmet lunged forward and gave the tip of his tail a yank before scurrying off toward platform 3.

There was a bark of outrage that quickly condensed into:

“Your form is terrible!”

A delighted whistle escaped him and, without turning back, he called:

“Then you had better come correct me!”

The air displaced behind him, a secondary presence emerging from the slipstream he’d carved. There was a tug on his tail just before Ingo pulled up to his side.

“Honestly,” He huffed, nudging at Emmet’s spectral arm, “You studied aerodynamics; you should be aware of how inefficient this is.”

The plating slid shut at the contact and, unbalanced by his arms’ sudden exit, Emmet wobbled in the air. As he sped up, Ingo pressed their sides together, steadying him until he was the one leading, purposefully cutting a path through the air for Emmet to follow.

Well that just proved it: two cars to a train, irregardless of the number of sub-trains within.

Some things simply did not change.

So long as he was breathing, he was alright. It proved he was still here, still alive, even when he felt like he was missing a lung. Careful, steady breaths; fill, hold, let go. He couldn’t afford a panicked gasp while working at half capacity, couldn’t risk a lack of oxygen and a spinning head.

He became quite good at it, tracking where he was in the process to keep himself from lashing out at nosy reporters and insensitive comments. If he breathed out until there was nothing in his lungs, he was physically incapable of snapping back and escalating the situation.

The carefully laid pattern hitched at the sound of his brother’s name, and he changed tracks, slowly blowing it out; even when he knew it was coming, it always caught him off guard, caused his breath to catch like a tug on the collar. He didn’t like the way people had taken to saying it, as a resigned sigh or an accusation. It just sounded wrong, even when the pronunciation was perfect.

Practiced from months of forcing the matter, he held his tongue.

Four seconds in, keep going. There was nothing wrong with the air; it was just his own outrage that made it feel so stifling. The oxygen boiled in his chest, and it was hard to hold it the full seven seconds without being scalded, harder still to exhale an entire eight when it rushed from his lungs, super heated and eager to escape.

Emmet’s hands clenched around nothing. Time to start again. Think of it this way: he had a lot in common with a steam engine right now. It was too hot in here to see the evidence, but maybe outside in the cold, the clouds would be visible trailing from his lips.

The man pacing before him turned on a heel, laying out his case, and Emmet managed to relegate a disbelieving laugh to a harsh huff of air. Of course. Yes, surely that was what happened the night his twin vanished.

Ridiculous. Emmet didn’t understand how anyone could believe that, why someone would waste their breath on it. This person had to have known better ways to spend such a precious resource, because the words he chose were utterly worthless. He clearly bought into it, though, eyes alight, cheeks flushed as he outlined his impossible version of events. Maybe he could stand to take a moment and recoup, breath deep enough to realize he’d lost his head somewhere in all of that and start talking sense instead.

He talked about the subway tunnels that had laid empty during weeks of investigation, of what had and hadn’t been found. Ironically, it was as though he was a train, charging ahead relentlessly, his words a deafening rumble in a room that was otherwise quite quiet, and when he was finished, the gasp for air wasn’t so different from a car pulling into station. Emmet was a little tempted to try yanking his chain, just to see if the man might also whistle.

There, see? All that time, and he hadn’t had to moderate a thing; sometimes his body could be trusted to maintain a course on its own. Thinking as much was a mistake, because Emmet was immediately made aware of the rise and fall of his chest, and his controls switched over from automatic to manual once again.

Someone was speaking to him, and he made sure to draw a silent, even breath, so as not to drown them out. If they were making the effort to address him, the least he could do was ensure that they didn’t have to repeat themselves. Swords of Justice knew once was enough.

They reached their point in perfect sync with his pattern; topic established in seven seconds, question posed by the end of the eight.

Emmet took another breath, cloying in spite of the chill that settled over him, and leaned forward so his statement wouldn’t be lost. He’d said it so many times already, at least now he could get it on the record-- maybe then people would stop making him echo it over and over again.

“No.” He said flatly, without an ounce of intonation in his voice. Why bother when it had proven to be such a lost cause? Nobody had been any more convinced when he’d forced his tone to match his sincerity.

“I did not kill my brother.”

While it wasn't exactly surprising that a great number of Hisuians were afraid of it, that fact was still a bit disappointing. Ingo always made a point of demonstrating just how amiable Pokemon could be, and Gliscor was no exception; how could they think he was scary when you scratched his ears and his tongue poked out?

A mystery for the ages, because they certainly didn’t seem swayed.

Some of the children were receptive, though-- specifically those of the Pearl Clan who were accustomed to seeing the pre-evolution riding the air currents. Gliscor could spend hours catching the sticks or rocks they threw into the air, bringing the object back with a happy chirp and a thunk of his great barbed tail.

He was a wonderful companion when a clan meeting drew long and the commute to the Highlands stretched before Ingo, acting as a second set of eyes in the dark. There were times that Gliscor detected a threat and sent himself into battle before Ingo had any say in the matter, which might have been disconcerting if not for the fact that he’d headed off more than one Zoroark before it could get the drop on them.

Ingo counted himself fortunate to have such a loving, loyal companion, and did his best to take care of Gliscor in turn. They trained hard and Gliscor flourished, wearing his wide, sharp-toothed grin through even the toughest of battles. His typing made him incredibly resilient, the greatest hurdle to pass in Ingo’s team, but even when he was knocked down for the count, it was made better with the right medicines and encouraging words. Sometimes Ingo wondered if Gliscor didn’t enjoy being treated, just because it was a different form of attention.

What a ridiculous, remarkable Pokemon.

As the season progressed, Gliscor was happy to help gather for the months ahead, assisting with berries too high to reach or scoping out areas that hadn’t yet been picked over by the local Pokemon. For today, though, he’d only been needed in battle, fending off a Luxio too pushy for its own good.

The snowfall outside increased, and Ingo leaned on the foraging basket, watching from the mouth of the cave he’d ducked into. It was an unwelcome delay, certainly, but he’d just have to weather it. All of the signs suggested it would cease before nightfall, and he was best off staying as dry and warm as possible until then.

Leaving the heavy basket where it was, he retreated to the far end of the shallow den, considering his options.

The foremost pokeball on his hip began to shake.

“No.” He told it, “Please remain seated.”

Gliscor immediately sprung out, chittering up a storm.

Ingo sighed. “There’s no need to worry. The storm will abate before long, I simply have to wait it out. You’re far better off in your pokeball.”

Gliscor considered this, and then gently bullied its trainer so he was sitting, clambering happily into his lap. While it wasn’t at all what he’d been arguing towards, Ingo supposed that also worked, and automatically reached up to ease his fingers into the fur behind the bat’s ear.

There was a sharp, displeased click, so startling that Ingo froze in place. He raised his hand again, trying to get a better look, only for Gliscor to ward him away for a second time.

“Are you hurt?” He asked, growing more concerned by the second. Since when did Gliscor turn up an ear scratch? The behavior was completely alien coming from the cuddle bug on his lap-- which meant he had to be missing something.

Gliscor chattered again, shifting to find an optimal spot, and then used his wings to rein in any wayward limbs. Once he’d finished with that, he rested his head on Ingo’s shoulder, warmth pooling beneath it.

Ah, so that was what he was up to.

Ingo leaned in toward him, eliciting a raspy purr, and, without emerging from the safety the Pokemon had created for him, ran a hand along its inner wing. “You’re a wonderful friend, Gliscor. I fear I don’t tell you that enough.”

There was a brief, dissenting tug on his hair, and Gliscor shuffled that last tiny bit nearer, head bowed and wing lifted to offer just a bit more protection from the cold.

Someday, Ingo hoped, his fellow humans might know such a bond.

He would be the first to admit that Ingo’s disappearance had gutted him, that his brother’s absence haunted his every waking moment; given the circumstances, he thought he was handling it… well enough, but, from an outsider perspective, that seemed to translate to ‘terribly’.

Maybe it was all in his head, the feeling that from the day his twin vanished, something changed in Gear Station-- the echoes louder, more distinct, and the darkness swelling with a previously unseen depth. There was every likelihood that it was some maladjusted coping mechanism, seeing dangers that didn’t exist in a misguided attempt to find closure. If the shadows were suddenly alive, then maybe they were to blame, maybe they had spirited Ingo away.

He hated to think that, though, and not because it meant he was fighting a losing battle for his sanity. It hurt to know that they could destroy one another like this-- that, if Ingo was still out there, Emmet could unknowingly be causing him the very same anguish.

Sometimes, Emmet subtly tried to gauge how real reality was, asking, for example, if Cloud had heard anything when he knew there was a voice echoing down the tunnels, or whether it seemed darker than usual when the shadows were so established that they formed a low-lying fog. If anyone else was experiencing what he did, they were keeping remarkably silent about it.

As time passed, the phenomena became more extreme. The occasional shout from faraway or burst of words through radio static became constant whispering, the words still indistinct, but different from what he’d been growing accustomed to; where it started melancholy and pleading, it eased into something angry, then sharp and hissing. Already alarmingly animate, the shadows felt like they were watching him now, judging, waiting for… something. He didn’t want to know what.

It was the worst he’d felt at the station since his solo return. Until now, the building air had been unnerving, but not unsafe; he’d never feared for anything but his soundness of mind when the darkness shifted or the tunnels hummed. Now, though, Emmet was concerned-- not only for himself, but for the staff and patrons. The atmosphere was outright hostile and he didn’t know how to ensure safety without coming across as a lunatic. There were days he’d considered not coming in because it was becoming such a burden, but the thought of what might happen in his absence kept him dutifully on schedule. If he was the only one who could see it, he had a duty to be there, to contribute whatever he could.

In short, he was frazzled and exhausted, nearing wit’s end with no respite in sight.

So really, he was due for a mental breakdown.

---

Ingo was pissed off.

That happened a lot more than it used to, he realized as the gaps in his being slowly filled, and a part of him understood why Giratina might have lashed out the way it did. It was maddening to exist without really existing, to watch the world turn and remain separate from it.

He didn’t get it. He’d endured the centuries separating Hisui from the modern day and remained tied the distortion world-- he’d witnessed his own fall through existence and nothing had changed, save for the new, firsthand recollection of reality collapsing in on itself.

Emmet was suffering, and nothing he tried did anything. Why was he still stuck here? He’d waited, he’d done exactly as Arceus had instructed-- how long was he supposed to stand by and allow this to go on?

Yes, he pushed the boundaries, and yes, he’d do it over and over again, no matter how many times Giratina rolled its eyes at him or The Alpha Pokemon yanked him into glorified time out. He could tell something was changing with his actions, the prolonged exposure to nonexistence gradually wearing thin the barrier between Arceus’s realm and its counterpart-- he just had to figure out how to make use of it.

Ingo remembered that he’d enjoyed people watching once upon a time-- had been quite good at it, even. He’d had no way of knowing what a ‘cold read’ was in Hisui, but he knew now that it was part of why he excelled as a trainer. The ability to read a Pokemon and its trainer before either made a move or uttered a command was an invaluable skill, giving one a prominent advantage in battle.

He did not need any of that skill to recognize the ill intent in the individuals haunting the station.

They lurked behind any conceivable scrap of cover, always watching his twin, always lurking nearby. It was almost impressive, the way they moved without ever revealing themselves, in spite of their firm ties to the material plane. Unfortunately for them, Ingo had the advantage of a liminal existence, seeing through their camouflage without being able to be perceived in turn.

There were three of them. Brothers of a sort, from what he could gather, though that information was extremely limited. They whispered to each other about Team Plasma’s fall, about regaining their leader’s lost heart with this act of overwhelming victory.

In very short order, Ingo was able to put together that they intended to conquer the rail system, a feat many a Plasma Grunt had tried in the past without success. This time was different, though; the Battle Subway was down one of its heads, and the trio was making a concerted effort to wear Emmet down. If they could just counteract the remaining Subway Boss’s presence, then the coast would be clear.

That wouldn’t stand.

When one of the three made a move, tried to harass Emmet more directly, Ingo decided he didn’t care what the repercussions would be. He was seeing this to its final terminal.

---

Everything stopped.

The bustle of daily operation, the murmur of a genial crowd, even the flow of air through the station ceased. In one fell swoop, the darkness Emmet had grown used to ignoring flooded in from behind him, coalescing into a blanket so thick that it blotted existence itself out.

This time, though, it wasn’t prying eyes and prickling whispers. It was pure fury, thick enough to choke on, like a lungful of acrid black smoke. He instinctively tried to cough, and sputtered when he didn’t meet the expected resistance.

Something shifted in the murk not so far away, subtle at first, and then frantic; he thought he might have heard an intake of breath, but it was quickly drowned out.

Just as suddenly as it had rolled in, the fog bank evaporated and operations resumed around him, but he barely processed any of it. There was only one thing echoing in his ears:

“You’re the ones who have been hurting my brother out there.”

“I’m going to end you.”

But years had passed since then, and he… didn’t think he could do it anymore. It grated on him, pretending to be something he wasn’t, even with the person he was closest to. In the safety of doors behind closed doors he could admit to himself that he wasn’t a woman, but even at home, he’d kept up the ruse.

Irma was tired. He didn’t want to hide anymore, not from Emma-- but more than even that, he didn’t want to hurt her. There were nights he went back and forth on it ceaselessly, could he hold out just a little while longer, long enough to come up with a more elegant explanation? He’d already spent this long trying to articulate his feelings on the matter, so was there any amount of time that could help in that regard?

Would she be upset with him?

At a certain point, he wound himself into so many tight coils that it was easier to step back and let them unravel. He knew his sister; no matter what anyone said about her, she was a logical, understanding, loving person. While their image as identical twins was important to her, he knew her heart would be in the right place.

Part of Irma said he’d waited this long, what was just a little longer, to be entirely sure?

Another part said that he’d waited this long already; it was time to get it over with, to finally share this with someone.

He found her in the kitchen, leaning against the counter as she peeled an orange, playing dumb about the aspear Archeops was begging for. Garbodor helpfully blocked most of the kitchen entryway, coveting the growing pile of pith, and he had to coax her out of the way to gain access.

“I know,” He told her, indulgent as she crooned the saddest cry he’d heard since she’d caught sight of their still-full styrofoam cups last week, “We’ll ask if she won’t share with such a good girl.”

“I make no promises.” Emma said, smiling idly at her slow progress.

In lieu of a response, he gave a loud, fond sigh and crossed the space between them, taking up his spot at her side. Giving up on its trainer for the time being, Archeops turned its eyes toward him instead.

His sister shot him a preemptive warning glance. “Do not.”

Just to prove his innocence, Irma held his hands up, demonstrating that they were empty. Unconvinced, she eyed him up and down, but did eventually return to her crusade against pith.

“You are quiet.” She said after a moment, peeling another strand away, “Did someone tell you to smile again? I will make them stop.”

“No, and even if one of today’s passengers had, I wouldn’t tell you which one for that precise reason.”

“Boo,” She scoffed and split the orange down the center, neatly extracting the core. “Then what is it?”

“I’m not entirely sure where to begin.”

“Then start with the facts.”

He hesitated.

“...Irma?”

“I haven’t been entirely honest with you.” He admitted after a long gap, and she eased back.

“Oh. That. Having your soul fed on is close enough to being sick. It counts for leave.”

The station might not see it the same way, but it was nice to know she was on his side in that regard. Still, it left him in an awkward position, and he wasn’t sure how to regroup.

“...not that?” Emma asked after a beat, sheepish in spite of the flat intonation.

“Not that.”

“Then what?”

He took a deep breath, trying to organize the maelstrom of thoughts that had ducked in and out of focus since he’d truly started questioning himself; his identity as an individual, his identity as a twin, and how to reconcile the both of them.  

“This isn’t a statement on you or our relation to one another,” He started tentatively, “And I hope I doesn’t come across as such. We’re twins, of course, but the last thing I want is to impress my… situation onto you."

Emma cocked her head, smile taking a turn for ‘trying not to look concerned’ and he forced himself to go on, to keep her from worrying over nothing,

“I simply wanted to tell you that I-- I would greatly appreciate it if you would consider me your brother, going onward, instead of...”

He suddenly found his hands full of the orange, which was somewhat less distracting than the fact that Emma was holding him by both sides of the face, eyes alight.

“You’re telling me that you are a man.”

“...yes.”

Even though it was said in complete seriousness, there was a gleeful note in, “I wanted to match. So I stayed quiet.”

It only took a second to process.

“Oh, Emm--” Irma stopped abruptly, changing course, “Matching one another isn’t more important than your well being; I wish you would have said something sooner.”

“I told you.” His twin argued, giving either side of his face a delighted pat; he was going to smell like oranges all night. “Just verrry recently. You had to go first. It’s tradition.”

“You’re ridiculous,” Irma told him, prying one hand away to tuck the well-peeled orange back where it belonged. His twin promptly tore the halves away from each other so they were fully separate, and shoved one at him.

“It is my job to be ridiculous. As your younger brother.” He said, sounding immensely proud of himself.

Taken slightly aback, Irma gave a bark of laughter-- louder than he’d intended, as always-- and shook his head.

“I suppose it is.”

Whatever that was, he physically could not move away from It-- couldn’t turn away or back off, found himself incapable of even closing his eyes against It. He really, really wished he could have done any of those things, but no, here he was, rooted in place as the distance between them slowly diminished.

But that wasn’t to say that It was moving forward. While there was motion in Its form-- millions of details too intricate to focus on in the face of such danger-- Ingo would be hard pressed to say that It was ambulating towards him. Swords knew he wasn’t capable of moving from this spot, and the only other thing he could think was that, whatever It was, It was simply existing independent of the earth’s rotation, riding the planet like a slow moving sightseeing car.

The closer It-- or he?-- got, the more there was. By no means should something so massive fit the subway system. It was physically impossible. How hadn’t It brought the tunnel down on their heads? Again, the urge to turn and flee burned at him, every instinct screaming that he was in danger, and Ingo could do nothing but stand there in frozen horror.

Something in It flickered, and he had to fight down a wave of nausea at the sudden understanding that he had been Seen.

He tasted copper. For some unfathomable reason, his first response was to reach up and verify that, yes, his nose was bleeding. He couldn’t see the stain on his glove, unable to look away from the impossible creature before him, but there was little mistaking what seeped into the fabric.

What he thought were the entity’s eyes caught on the motion and, crooning, It bowed its head, focusing entirely on him.

It was-- it was a little like Chandelure’s call, he thought for just a moment, before rejecting that and finding a note like when Crustle got his shell to sit just right in the morning, or Archeops crying for attention, or, or--

He found himself so consumed in the multitudes of Its voice that he didn’t notice as it drew nearer. Static blared in his ears, and that much was oddly comforting, until he remembered what was going on around him, and had time to wonder if it had been caused by Its cry or the form Itself, actively advancing upon him.

Gods, he-- he wanted to be anywhere but here right now. He didn’t care where, just-- just away from It.

A wail cut through the snow in his head-- and there it was again, the noise Garbodor made when she got takeout containers from the Kalosian place off of Main-- and the being… maneuvered Itself around him, somehow. It was tempting to say It oozed like a Ditto, but that wasn’t quite right. Ingo just didn’t have words for what it was.

At the very least, with It out of his line of sight, Ingo found himself free to look wherever he pleased; he even managed to stumble forward for a couple of steps, keenly aware of what was behind him, but unable to muster the courage to turn and face It again.

It tugged on his collar and he found himself lifted off of his feet, dangling helplessly in the air as something crackled to life in the ground, heinously bright against the tunnel’s pitch dark, and yet still pale in comparison to whatever It was holding him at Its mercy.

There was a huff against the back of his neck, apology and a promise all in one-- like Tangela after she’d first used Stun Spore on him or when Sneasler--

...what?

He didn’t have a-- What was a--?

The taut cloth of his collar went slack. Unseen, It let go, and Ingo fell.

Moments later, a man awoke on the edge of a snowy settlement.

He was so, so sick of medical facilities. His own stint into the past had been brief, but still necessitated decontamination and a period of isolation; the first he bowed to, the second he raised a fuss over until they conceded that, having spent weeks together, it was likely the twins had long since been exposed to anything the other carried.

After that, the concerns had turned to more general fare. While Ingo was doing perfectly fine by Hisuian practices, according to modern standards… no. No, he wasn’t. There had been half a dozen concerns to address right off the bat-- malnutrition, readjusting to medications, and a partial detransition among others-- all compounded by the fact that Hisui-era Sinnoan was only mostly compatible with its current day variant.

They’d spent a good portion of time back in Hisui working through Emmet’s half-remembered Sinnoan and Ingo’s archaic version to come to a mostly-accurate understanding of what the other meant when he spoke. It worked wonders in alerting one’s sibling to the presence of an angry alpha or pretentious warden, but was less than ideal for conveying technical jargon.

On the bright side, though, the railway terminology was practically 1:1 from the get go. Small mercies.

Still, the language barrier was a substantial issue, and, both unfamiliar with contemporary practices and unable to understand the offered translations, Ingo frequently deferred to Emmet’s interpretation. It was a role he wasn’t wholly comfortable with, but if the alternative was the problems going unaddressed, he would take it up.

So now here they were, weeks after returning to their era of origin and only just getting home. Any remaining concerns were less a matter of immediate health complications, and more corrective or therapeutic treatments-- and none was more vexing than Ingo’s persisting slouch.

He’d endured a number of back injuries, yes, but there didn’t seem to be any major damage to his spine or shoulders. When asked, he had denied that he was in any pain, so it wasn’t a reactive response. Theoretically it could have been genetic, but he also had this funny thing called an identical twin who didn’t share the ailment.

It was exhausting for everyone involved, and by the time the third round of testing was over, Emmet was beyond happy to collapse into the sofa. After a few minutes passed and he’d had time to gather his wits, he peered out from beneath the arm tossed over his face. Across the room, Ingo plucked at the back brace he’d been recommended, looking as if it had personally offended him.

Yeah, that… that was a problem for future Emmet.

And it would turn out to be a problem for future Emmet, but also a solution-- because, physically incapable of curling his shoulders forward, Ingo subconsciously found a new way around the underlying issue: as soon as they’d managed to apply the brace as per the instructions, he folded his arms over his chest.

It took about half an hour for Emmet to notice, but he maintained the posture that entire time. Even while trying to do other things, one forearm would remain pressed to his body. The reluctance to drop it was puzzling… until it wasn’t.

“Question,” Emmet said, after observing his brother’s attempts to fight Gliscor away from one of their model train sets singlehandedly, “You would have been wearing a sleeveless black undershirt when you arrived in Hisui. What happened to it?”

He was rewarded with a blank stare. “I’m not familiar with with a garment of that nature. If it was on my person at that time, it was likely shredded in the Zoroark attack and subsequently discarded by the clan medic.”

“Yup. Okay. So you are attempting to minimize your chest.”

As if in response, Ingo raised his other arm to join the first, further obscuring the curve of his breasts.

Well there it was. Got it in twelve.

Resisting the urge to roll his eyes, Emmet circled around behind his twin and took him by the shoulder, steering him back down the hall to their bedrooms.

“We are identical.” He said somewhat unnecessarily, “I have them as well. You are being ridiculous.”

Ingo shot him a dubious look, first to his face and then, briefly, to his chest. Though it didn’t release his hold, the hand nearest Emmet gestured at the difference between them.

“That is due to my binder. You own a number of them as well. We will reestablish how to use them safely. If I am correct and that resolves the matter of your slouch, you may be rid of the back brace.”

Arceus above, all this confusion and it had been something so simple. Emmet couldn’t be mad, though; it was actually kind of funny.

This matter, at least, they didn’t need a doctor to settle.

The instant he’d heard Akari’s name rumble through the village, Ingo had known what was about to happen. Given how closely his own arrival had coincided with the rift’s appearance, he’d suffered a similar level of scrutiny from the Pearls, and while the situation had resolved itself for the better, he’d been prepared for the worst. Now, as the whispers of suspicion grew in volume, he was being forced to reexamine that worst case scenario from a new angle.

It hadn’t been a difficult task, to head Kamado off. The sky had begun to bleed just after daybreak, by which point the Commander was already established in his office. All Ingo had to do was speak to him before he could do anything rash.

There was little doubt that, after Kamado dealt with the supposed threat nearest to him, his attention would turn to its more complicated cousin. Ingo was a grown man, an accomplished handler of Pokemon, and a Warden of the Pearl Clan; the Commander held sway over him only insofar as his position within Galaxy Team, which was… not much. He wasn’t dependent on Jubilife Village for food or shelter, didn’t rely on a corpsman’s give-and-take. His presence in the village at all was a gesture of good will, the Pearl Clan lending a helping hand.

If Kamado tried to detain him-- a member of the clan venerating Sinnoh’s blessed space-- against his will, it would spark a conflict Galaxy Team couldn’t afford.

But if he went voluntarily, that would be another story.

Ingo was under no illusions that his compliance would get Akari off the hook entirely; even if, by some miracle, she was proven wholly, indisputably innocent, the seeds of doubt would remain. The most this would do was lessen the sentence, buy her time, perhaps-- it would give her a chance to survive on her own. That task would be a staggering one regardless, but he had little doubt she could rise to it.

He rolled a pokeball between his hands. It was soothing to hold, but also served as a reminder to those standing opposite him just what his team was capable of, and who they were dealing with. If, disregarding tensions between the factions, they attempted to force his hand, he was more than capable of pushing back.

Zisu’s expression twisted into an uneasy grimace, glancing from the pokeball to his face, and a hand migrated to the tasseled version on her hip. Across from her, Cyllene glanced to her Abra, fingers tapping a staccato rhythm against her arm.

“Whatever you would ask of Miss Akari, you may ask me instead; I will cooperate to the best of my abilities, limited though they may be. My only stipulation is that you don’t burden her with this.”

To his simultaneous credit and discredit, Ingo was trying to make it work. It was easy enough to hide his shaking hands in a formal tuck behind the back, and very few were able to read him well enough to recognize the tells that his muscles were acting up. If that had been all, Emmet might even have let him get away with it, but of course it wasn’t. Insomnia was followed by fatigue, a loss of appetite backed by an intermittent nausea, and anxieties that had otherwise been settled came back in full force. There was no denying that something was wrong-- the only problem was that, no matter what combination of terms he looked up, he kept getting the same result.

It was a known fact that some Hisuian-era medicines relied upon pepaver somniferum, which was later renowned not only for its ability to enhance a medicine, but also its addictive compounds. Ingo had recognized the plant and its applications-- had known how to craft a remedy for a Pokemon from it-- so he’d certainly had contact with the flower at some point, thirteen months prior.

The odds that he was experiencing withdrawal more than a year after the fact were ridiculous.

And yet, when he returned from yet another visit to the doctor, that was their best guess. Blood tests were clear, but the symptoms sounded like withdrawal.

Emmet dropped his head into his hands and made a vague, frustrated noise.

“It should run its course soon enough,” Ingo said from the other side of the kitchen, considering what they had on hand for dinner preparations. That much was a relief; it meant that, tonight, he wasn’t too nauseated to consider eating. “Regardless of what it is, it isn’t contagious; so long as I’m not putting anyone at risk, I can handle it.”

“I have no doubt that you can handle it. You should not have to endure a mystery ailment because your doctor is incompetent.”

“You’re being too harsh; it’s a complicated situation, and he’s hardly to blame for not being well versed in an archaic form of medicine.” There was a beat, and then, “We haven’t used the spinach up, have we?”

“We definitely do not have any more.” Emmet said, just for the heck of it, and finally tilted his head up to rest on his left hand.

Ingo rolled his eyes and gave a dubious little hum as he went to check for himself. “If you’re not opposed, we can make stuffed mushrooms.”

“Yep. Sounds good.”

The kitchen eased into a comfortable silence for a few moments. While Ingo rounded ingredients up, Emmet moved from the table to the sink. As much as he appreciated the initiative involved in getting dinner started, he didn’t trust his twin with a knife right now; it just wasn’t safe when the tremors had no known trigger. He didn’t mind cutting vegetables, anyway.

The refrigerator door closed, followed by a minute intake of breath.

“I’m permitted to take something now that the tests have concluded, correct? I haven’t forgotten anything?”

“Look me in the eyes and ask that again.” Emmet said, and pointedly did not turn to accommodate. Behind him, Ingo sighed; it was more fond than it was exasperated, but it was getting closer to a 50-50 split than he preferred. The pain must have been worse than he was letting on. “You are allowed. Yep. Headache or muscular?”

“The former.”

“Then you want the little blue bottle.”

There was a huff of a laugh and he felt a hand on his shoulder as Ingo passed by, “I only needed the reminder the first few times, but thank you.”

His footsteps made it clear of the kitchen, but from the sound of things, he got waylaid by Sneasel and Galvantula before making it anywhere close to the medicine cabinet.

He would be a bit, then. Still, there was no reason for Emmet to put his part of meal prep off when he was already here. He was dimly aware of the sounds of a playful kit in the hallway, but had long since become desensitized to it; the noises only went on for a few minutes, anyway, mellowed by virtue of being aimed at a human caretaker. He ignored them in favor of washing and then disassembling the mushrooms.

It was only upon hearing his name that he looked up.

His brother was carrying Sneasel in one arm; the opposite hand held the blue bottle of painkillers, but also boasted a bandage that hadn’t been there five minutes prior.

“I believe I know what’s going on.”

“I should hope so.” Emmet said flatly, “You have certainly been poisoned enough to recognize the signs.”

Contrary to the response he’d expected, Ingo hastily turned his head to stifle a laugh. “Yes. Well.”

“Now you get to take more medication.”

“That’s actually what I wanted to tell you.” He hefted Sneasel higher. On instinct, she reached to anchor herself, but curbed the habit at the last second, “I haven’t taken anything for it, but my headache is beginning to ease. That makes me believe withdrawal may have been the correct diagnosis.”

For half a second, Emmet thought his brother had lost him, then the connection between the two ideas clicked. “No. I am willing to believe that your system adjusted to being poisoned out of necessity. I refuse to entertain that you became so used to it that its absence is causing withdrawal symptoms.”

“I don’t see why you find that so far-fetched; Pokemon adapting to their conditions is a well recorded phenomena, even if you disregard the variants that… no longer exist.”

“It is not about the science.” Emmet said, and turned back to his task with a renewed vigor.

And it really wasn’t. The theory was fine-- Emmet just didn’t want to follow up on the implications it presented. How many repeat poisonings did it take to reach resistance? How much venom did a person have to be exposed to before they found themselves immune? Whatever the answer to those questions, it had to have paled in comparison to the quantity needed for the system to actively believe itself dependent. On poison.

Across the room, there was a muted click and the scampering of clawed feet on tile.

“I’m sorry,” Ingo said, stepping carefully across the space, purposefully allowing his footfalls to ring out, “I thought you would find it amusing, but clearly that’s not the case.”

With more gusto than strictly necessary, Emmet chopped the next mushroom’s base, and it skittered across the counter top. Wordlessly, Ingo reached out to stop it, and then tossed it to Sneasel, who scampered to grab her treat before it could bounce off of the floor.

“Hisui is still finding ways to hurt you. That is why I didn’t laugh.”

There was a noncommittal hum to his side and, just as Emmet realized he’d run out of mushroom to prep, a peeled shallot was rolled into range. He pounced on the opportunity it presented.

“I’m not sure what to tell you.” Ingo eventually said, depositing the freshly washed greens onto the counter, and picked up the garlic in their place, “It was a harsh place, but not without its own brand of kindness.”

“I have only seen the former.”

It was immediately met with a challenging, if gentle, “That’s not true,” but Ingo was kind enough not to put together an entire counterargument when Emmet didn’t want to be convinced right now.

“We’ll speak about it another time.” He eventually concluded, and stopped his anxious passing-of-the-bulb from one hand to the other, breaking off two cloves, “For now, you clearly need to vent your frustration. Would you like to destroy the garlic, as well?”

Yes. He would very much like to destroy the garlic. And the poison in his twin’s system, the man who’d ripped them apart in the first place, and the unjust god of Pokemon who’d allowed any of it to happen.

But, today, he would settle for the garlic.

He couldn’t deny that he was scared, but not because he was, ostensibly, playing the role of ‘unwilling sacrifice’. His concern was that these people were completely disconnected from reality, and there was no telling what, precisely, they’d do when their little ritual to summon Zekrom failed. There was an infinitesimally small chance that some of them might wake up and see reason, but the odds didn’t favor that outcome. More likely, they’d become desperate or panic, double-down and try something drastic, and it was in his best interest not to let it get that far.

Not that there was much he could do about any of this. He’d spent several hours, at the very least, sleeping off the Spore he vaguely remembered taking to the face-- back before the world had gone sideways-- and his waking hours had been split between trying to glean any small scrap of information he could and working his way free of the restraints around his wrists and ankles. The latter hadn’t seen any success, save for the painfully raw spots along the heel of his hand, the former, however, hadn’t been an entirely futile endeavor.

He’d managed to figure out what their goal was, at least, and that they seemed to be unaffiliated with Team Plasma. Why they’d thought the Dragon of Ideals-- of all Pokemon-- would react to human sacrifice had been beyond him for some time, until one of his captors alluded to the Hero’s bloodline. It was still patently insane, but there was, at least, some semblance of logic in trying to use the Hero of Ideals’ descendant to draw out the like dragon. Truth be told, Ingo was more preoccupied with the fact that these people had been digging that deep into their family history than he was interested in the mission statement.

If there was a silver lining to any of this, it was that he was the one dealing with it, and not Emmet.

When the group’s movements began to find greater purpose and their excitement seemed to pick up, Ingo renewed his effort to break free, but still found himself on his knees in a slipshod circle drawn on the floor. He very nearly laughed when the leader began a chant that sounded like a drunken limerick on the 2 am pink line, and could only thank his lucky stars that his expression didn’t give him away.

Any amusement was cut short, however, when the same man drew a knife as if from nowhere, and brandished with an astonishing lack of blade safety. It found a temporary home in the meat of Ingo’s palm, and then the man backed off to do Swords knew what with it, the rest of the choir unceasing in their mantra. For a moment, Ingo focused on the throbbing in his hand, tucking it palm-inward against his coat to stem the bleeding in what little first aid he could manage from here. It may have been a mistake, because, when he looked up, his primary abductor was onto something else entirely.

There was… something in all of it about what was and what wasn’t, what should have been.

In hindsight, that might have been what did it: the fine line between a vision for what could be, and what simply couldn’t exist.

To Ingo’s incredulity, they did get an answer.

Just not from Zekrom.

It was a Pokemon unlike any he’d ever seen, all grey, gold and, ironically, red and black; swirling, serpentine, in its created darkness, it was difficult to make out all at once. After he’d struggled to one of the room’s sides, Ingo got a glimpse of red-tipped tendrils-- wings?-- and gold spikes, but it was an effort to put them into a cohesive picture.

When the room was empty of any other life, it turned its glowing eyes to him.

The image slowly drew into focus. Yes, a serpent, striped black, red and grey, with a golden crest trailing from its crown down its neck. Said neck curved as it dipped its head to inspect him, attention moving from the gag in his mouth to his bleeding hand and then the restraints. One of the spiked tendrils extended to snap the tie between his wrists and he eagerly shook it off, reaching up to free himself.

“Thank you.” He rasped, as loud as he was able to muster. Certainly, the Pokemon had just attacked and made short work of a dozen humans, but that was all the more reason to be polite to it. It seemed inclined to give him the benefit of the doubt, and he wasn’t going to forsake that.

The shadow limb moved upwards, and he felt a firm, repeated pressure through his hat.

“It will be okay.” It told him, and oh, that was bad. If it could speak telepathically, it had to be an incredibly powerful Pokemon; it was best to see it off… wherever it came from and contact the authorities. And possibly also Shauntal, if she still conducted exorcisms. At least he could be relatively certain he wouldn’t fall under suspicion for what had happened here. This-- this was rather beyond the abilities of humankind.

“It will be,” He confirmed, and tried to prop himself up on wobbling legs, “I have you to thank for that. I’m… very sorry you were so rudely dragged from your home. Please don’t feel you have to stay here on my account-- as you’ve said, I will be alright.”

“It will be okay.” It said again, its mental voice a mere suggestion of sound; the tendril that had been interacting with Ingo curled around his shoulders, and he had just that fraction of a second to realize this was not going to go how he’d hoped.

“You won’t remember any of this.”

He’d since come to terms with the stark difference between himself and his twin; it was something only a select few people would ever see, after all. If they’d decided they were comfortable enough to uncover their wings in front of someone-- which was to say Elesa-- odds were that person already knew how to tell the two of them apart, independent of color scheme. And really, if his wings had stayed black, what would that have meant for the Battle Subway’s aesthetic? The lighter color scheme had been a matter of practicality first and foremost; it was far easier to hide white feathers against a white coat than to try obscuring them against black.

Truthfully, he didn’t even remember much about the period of illness that had triggered the change. Mostly, he remembered their parents’ worried faces and how hot it had been, even when he repeatedly kicked off his covers. There were snatches of Ingo’s voice-- words too foggy to have withstood the test of time, but incredibly upset nonetheless-- and he knew that, when the sickness finally ran its course, he’d woken up to an otherwise empty bedroom. Any further detail had been lost, and by the end of it, his feathers had been dappled with a grey that, slowly, gave way to the white he now carried.

Oh, he’d been so upset back then. Their mother had explained to him that it was perfectly fine; the change didn’t mean he was sick, just that he had been and was better now. Their father had tried the angle that it should be a mark of pride, showing how resilient he’d been. Neither of those had been the issue, but, then again, Emmet was relatively certain he wouldn’t have accepted any argument tried on him. The only thing that he’d tolerated had been the mumbled, “Well I think they’re pretty.” as Ingo clumsily worked through the feathers, buried up to his little wrists.

To an extent, it had been his twin’s easy acceptance that soothed his mind, but also the limited scope. Emmet didn’t care what had caused the difference; he couldn’t understand the intricacies involved or why his illness had led to it, and he had no reason to be proud when he wasn’t even fully aware of how harsh the sickness had been.

An opinion, though-- that was easy. He didn’t have to follow Ingo’s logic; there didn’t even need to be any logic.  If Emmet wanted to, he could disagree, the way he liked tamato berries and Ingo didn’t, where neither of them was wrong.

Funny enough, Ingo eventually came around on tamatos, and Emmet came to accept his white wings.

Part of him, though, had never stopped wanting to match.

His hands combed through feathers, and he tried to figure out what entity might have overheard the long lived wish, which Pokemon might have deliberately misinterpreted it. Not like this-- he’d never wanted Ingo to be the one who retook their symmetry.

There was precious little dark amongst the light greys and whites, and that which existed was on its way out, damaged by time and claws. It was very, very clear that the one responsible for grooming his twin’s wings hadn’t been a human, but Sneasler. Feathers were nicked and tattered, but likely by no fault of the noble’s own; it couldn’t be easy to maneuver with such wickedly long claws. Even though he spotted a blood feather that had been cut and stemmed, it was still better than leaving the wings to wither.

The parts Ingo had been able to reach on his own were better, less frayed by several orders. That the amnesia hadn’t been able to erase the natural urge to preen was a comfort; though there was no evidence to suggest that the impairment might be reversible, that was one tiny bit of hope.

For all the physical damage that existed, plain to see, Emmet’s biggest concern was the shift in attitude. The broken feathers would molt and be replaced, and the color would eventually stabilize. What would be trickier-- far more akin to his own internal crisis as a small, confused child-- was the fact that Ingo had been doing his level best to avoid acknowledging that he had wings, and it… wasn’t difficult to tell why.

The Pearl Clan stared. There was an implicit understanding that the clan was a whole, and Emmet, at least, was an outsider. Maintaining any sort of relationship with them would have relied on blending in as much as possible and, therefore, hiding anything that stood out.

No wonder his brother’s feathers were in such a state. Stranded on the opposite side of the world and lost to time without even a working memory to fall back on, reliant on people who accepted him only once he buried a major facet of his being, and even then seemed wary of the mannerisms that made Ingo himself… Emmet had considered his side of their separation stressful-- he’d even joked, ruefully, to Elesa that the whole thing was going to give him grey feathers-- but not to this extent.

He thought back to the hazy days after his wings had turned, combing the depths of his memory for anything that might offer some measure of solace, and came up empty handed. The underlying issue here wasn’t a matter of cosmetics, it was that Ingo’s view of his wings had changed for the worse. He couldn’t write that off with senseless positivity, and any contrasting opinion he could offer would come across as an empty platitude at best.

There was something he could do, though-- maybe not here and now, but a step forward once they got home. He decided right then that he would stop covering his own wings up, would prove to Ingo that not everyone judged so harshly.

In the meantime, he let his hands sink into the dappled feathers, wrist deep.

He spent three hours blindly fighting his way though a cave system, fending off an absurd number of Golbat and trying to keep himself from getting turned around before he had even the slightest amount of luck... if one could call encountering the Diamond Warden ‘lucky’. While it had culminated in some helpful information, Emmet hesitated to call it a positive encounter; he worried that perhaps his brother wasn’t here, either, if Melli’s ranting and the cave’s extinguished torches were anything to go by.

But he was already here, and now that he had directions to the Templeside Arena and its adjoining campsite, he may as well investigate.

The first sign that he was on the right track were what seemed, to the best of his knowledge, species that weren’t native to this part of the Coronet Highlands. There was a Machamp halfheartedly fighting a much-worn practice dummy, an Alakazam hovering in meditation that opened one eye at his approach, and then did a double-take, and a Tangrowth languidly sorting through a variety of limp flowers. All of them were suspiciously evolved, given the methods required and their proximity to one another-- certainly not a gathering of wild Pokemon.

The Tangrowth sat up straighter as he neared the tent it was camped out next to, abandoning its sets of flowers to reach a vine out to him and grab the end of his coat; he humored it as it shook the fabric. When it seemed satisfied with whatever test it was running, it blinked at him, warbled, and settled back in place but, noticeably, didn’t go back to its original distraction.

There were a great number of eyes on him-- even more if he counted the nearby Magnezone and Probopass-- though none of the Pokemon made to intercept as he laid a hand on the tent’s door.

Half a second after stepping through the threshold, Emmet wondered if it actually was any better inside, in that regard. While there were fewer Pokemon to stare at him in here, it was made up for with the intensity of the Gliscor’s glare. It chattered his way, clearly scolding him, and shuffled minutely in place.

Somewhat unwisely, he took a step closer. It growled in return, and only stopped when something jostled it from below with a pathetic, muffled cough.

And there it was: the reason Emmet had dared to draw nearer, in spite of the defensive predator mantling over the bed. He was not the only human present. The other was visible only through the shroud of a blanket, any glimpse of their upper half hidden beneath the angry bat who’d been so thoughtful as to greet him.

Said Gliscor continued to stare at him in reproach, but didn’t make any further noises.

“It is alright,” He told it, voice low in lieu of any false inflection, “I am not here to hurt anyone. Are you protecting your trainer? Are they functioning properly?”

Its eyes flickered, uncertain, toward a small pile of offerings on the floor. There were a number of berries beginning to shrivel, a couple of the flowers from Tangrowth’s collection-- all completely withered-- and, among them, one very dry looking rice ball. Emmet wasn’t sure what any of it was meant to accomplish, but had to trust that the contributing Pokemon were motivated by some kind of logic.

After several second’s worth of consideration, the Gliscor ducked its head, burying its face into the flash of silver beneath and emerging just enough to keep an eye on Emmet.

He took another cautious step forward. “I am Emmet. You have been trying verrrry hard to take care of your trainer. I believe I can assist.” Its ears flicked; he inched forward again, “Can you help me in return? I am looking for my brother. We are identical. Twins. And we were separated a verrry long time ago.”

Gliscor rumbled around the clump of hair it was nibbling on and, without ever tearing its eyes away from Emmet, slowly drew a wing back. There was a weak hiss of protest, a shiver clear in the stuttering exhalation that followed, and Gliscor squeaked, hurrying to right itself.

It was a short window, but there was nothing wrong with that. They both wanted the same thing when it came down to it, right?

Emmet could play caretaker. He could handle Ingo being sick or injured. So long as his twin was actually here, he would be fine, and would ensure both of their well being.

“Good job.” He told Gliscor, once the bat had settled itself sufficiently, “You have done a verrry good job.”

---

Perhaps soothed by the fact that this strange new human hadn’t attacked in the night, Gliscor seemed comfortable enough to leave the tent the next morning, to hunt and properly stretch its wings. Chandelure gleefully took the opportunity to channel her emotions into thermal energy and steadily increased the tent’s temperature until Emmet was forced to ask her, quite literally, to cool it.

It was early afternoon by the time Ingo dragged himself to some degree of awareness, visibly trying to figure out where Gliscor had gone.

He was almost immediately confronted with seventy five pounds of lamp in his face, which would have been a lot to wake up to, even on a good day. Emmet tried to coax Chandelure away, but, at the same time, found it hard to blame her when all he wanted was to follow a similar track.

There was a glazed look to Ingo’s eyes as he absently pet Chandelure’s globe-- something distinct from the haze of fever-- and it only intensified as his attention skirted up, toward the only other human in the tent.

He was getting overwhelmed. That was understandable, considering how out of it he’d been the last time he’d been forced to take sick leave; he’d woken expecting his Gliscor and, instead, been met with two uninvited guests.

Ingo managed an odd, mostly-soundless croak as Emmet eased Chandelure away, coughing feebly into his opposite elbow as his twin propped him up to get a drink. It was one of those illnesses, then. In the past, there had been something comedic about his human megaphone of a sibling being silenced, albeit tempered by how poorly he felt. Here and now, combined with the fact that he’d been left to weather this on his own, bereft of any human assistance, it was just sad.

“I am Emmet,” Emmet announced as he stepped away, letting Ingo ease back onto his side, “I will help you recover. Do not worry.”

Though without a whisper of sound, he recognized the shape of his name as Ingo echoed it.

He smoothed a hand over the topmost blanket and nodded. “Yep. I am Emmet. I am here.”

Emmet had been happy to get rid of them, seeing no need to linger on that portion of his life, but he’d underestimated just how desperate he’d been back in the thick of things. It seemed like every other time someone went to get something from the closet or shook out a blanket, a wayward bulletin would tumble out, unwilling to be left in the past.

Ironic, considering where their subject had wound up, but after months of finding the fliers at inconvenient times-- which was also a little on the nose-- Emmet was in no mood to humor the metaphor. He knew there was no forgetting what had happened, but it would be nice not to face a reminder every six hours.

Ingo never breathed a word about the posters, but there was something going on there. On more than one occasion, Emmet had glanced over to find his twin staring at his own likeness with a closed off expression, even for him. He refused to walk over and snatch the offending leaflets away, but, whenever he found one himself, was quick to fold it into haphazard fourths before anyone saw.

It was a little strange; trashing the greater portion of them had been cathartic, a definitive end to their function and his isolation, but when it was just one here or there, it was almost sad. There was a time in his life when they’d represented a thread of hope, when he’d scattered them so thoroughly that now it was harder to be rid of them than to find one. With that not-so-distant memory attached, picking one up and throwing it away almost felt like giving up, even though, at worst, Ingo was just a room away.

Even more grating was the knowledge that, even if Emmet succeeded in cleaning them all out, there would be some he didn’t have jurisdiction over; at one point, while weighing the pros and cons of interrupting Ingo’s staring contest with himself, he’d caught his brother shuffle the paper to the back of his document stack, and then deliberately take it to his room. In hindsight, it seemed a sure thing that the other sheets he’d handled thusly met the same fate. Emmet had no earthly idea what reason his twin could have for collecting his missing posters, but, going by his demeanor, it couldn’t be productive.

And then the hangup was all but shoved into his lap.

“How… how many did you make?” Ingo asked, eyes dropping to the block of text.

Trusting that he’d been seen in the peripheral vision, Emmet tossed his hands up and gestured one way and then the other, to the apartment as a whole. When it failed to elicit a response, he dropped them and said, “Only Arceus knows.”

Without looking up from the paper, Ingo raised a hand to knead at the space between his eyes.

“How many variations did you make?” He tried again, a moment later.

That, at least, was a question mortal men could answer. “I believe I was up to six.”

“Why?”

“They would frequently be damaged or tear away. It was prudent to replace them.”

“That explains the quantity,” Ingo said dryly, “Not the content.”

Save for the brief warble of paper, the room lapsed into a heavy silence.

“People began to ignore them.” Emmet admitted after a moment. “They became part of the background. If the pictures changed, people looked. It only made sense to update the information accordingly, as well.”

The hand at Ingo’s forehead dropped to idle at his chin, half obscuring his face for all that that mattered. At one point, he inhaled audibly and moved as though he were about to say something, but didn’t follow through.

Gently, even-toned as always, Emmet asked, “Can you explain what you are thinking right now?”

“I just wish that I was still--” The response was nearly immediate-- hasty and, therefore, unfiltered up to the point where Ingo caught up to himself and snapped his mouth shut.

Well that made sense under the circumstances, didn’t it?

Emmet closed his eyes and took a deep breath, trying to figure out how in the world he could help with this ongoing identity crisis. Before he could formulate an adequate response, though, he was preempted.

“I’m not the person you were looking for.”

“Ingo. That’s not--”

There was the sound of movement and paper warping under a mild breeze. He opened his eyes just in time to see his brother press the sheet to his chest and turn away.

“Memories are ephemeral; if you want to hold onto him, you’ll need something more substantial. I just worry that you’re discarding these prematurely.”

When he’d agreed to act as warden, his understanding had been that it was something of a public service-- to help watch over a territory and see travelers safely through, in addition to assisting the Noble. What he hadn’t been informed was that wardens were somewhat more connected to their charges than simple caretaking.

The way a Noble Pokemon was unique in their sensitivity to humans, wardens grew to open their hearts to Pokemon in turn, taking on aspects of the Noble they served.

It seemed, to Ingo, maybe a little misguided. A person didn’t need to embody the Pokemon they fought with to find common ground, and expecting only wardens to pursue such attachments felt like it would stifle the growth of the Hisuian people, but who was he to say? He was just the strange man who’d appeared from nowhere-- which, in all fairness, was exactly why that part of the job had come as a surprise to him. It seemed to be a universal understanding among the clans, so it was just another example of him being clueless due to cultural differences. To her credit, Irida had realized the problem within the first week, and taken the time to educate him.

Now, however, they were well past a few measly weeks, and things were not going well.

Of all 18 types, fighting seemed like it should be one of the simpler ones for a human being to emulate, but it was proving quite the opposite. It wasn’t even that Ingo was incapable of keeping up, because his time in the Highlands had imparted an endurance far beyond what he’d arrived with; there was just something he was missing, reaching beyond the obvious physical stances and forms.

Sinnoh bless her, Sneasler had taken it as a personal challenge to help him understand. She was, however, a harsh taskmistress; she absolutely delighted in pushing him just that little bit past what he’d previously been capable of and, oftentimes, watching him make a fool of himself as a result.

Months in, and it was still very strange to Ingo, to have the roles so thoroughly inverted. He was relatively certain that, wherever he came from, humans trained Pokemon and never the other way around.

In the here and now, Sneasler seemed to decide that Ingo’s situation was funny after all, and-- after getting a good laugh in at his expense-- took pity on her warden. While he was usually happy to accept temporary responsibility for one of her kits, today, under the same threat, he held both hands up, trying to ward her off.

“Sneasler, no! I’m horribly sweaty. Your children are adorable, but their fur--”

The protest was cut short as a young Sneasel was deposited onto his chest and promptly scuttled over to tuck itself beneath his chin. Unable to deny it the attention it was seeking, Ingo resigned himself to an early visit to the waterside and reached up to ruffle its fur.

This, he’d learned, was a strangely effective way to moderate one’s breathing. Without a doubt it was harder to breathe when there was a small creature on one’s chest, but it also made a person incredibly aware of how much force it took to inhale, or how to slow the exhalation. It was a handy tool in practicing mindfulness.

Or… not, as things stood. Not only had he failed to notice Sneasler’s departure, caught up in finally being allowed to rest, but until that moment, neither had he noticed the untimely arrival of the Alpha Mismagius, lurking ever nearer.

He reached for Gliscor’s pokeball, but came up empty handed, his belt lost somewhere in the tangle of fabric at his side. Unable to risk the time it would take to find it, he leaped to his feet and tried to put some distance between them; the Mismagius, undeterred, trailed right after, its eyes glowing with a building psychic power.

The kit could do nothing to fend it off, too small to break any but the tiniest of boulders, unable even regulate its poison yet. Without a trace of doubt, Ingo knew he would play the barrier between Sneasel and the alpha if it came down to it, he just-- he didn’t know what he could do to prevent that eventuality. If it were a Luxray or Steelix, he could throw something or try to strike it, but a ghost? That was orders more complicated.

Fragments of rock tumbled from the cliff side and Ingo glanced up, to where Sneasler was furiously sliding down the embankment toward them. None of her moves would be horribly effective, but she was Noble for a reason; if nothing else, she could keep Mismagius busy while he removed her kit from the area of effect and sought assistance from his team.

That planning was all tossed to the side as the Mismagius let out a screech and released its attack. Psychic, almost certainly strong style the way it had been moving.

Ingo braced the Sneasel against his chest and began to pivot, but something stopped him; all he managed to do was plant his feet more firmly. The hand flung up to counterbalance felt, for just a moment, like it brushed up against something solid, and the blast of psychic energy dissipated as soon as it met his outstretched fingers.

Oh, he thought numbly, stumbling back with the Sneasel clutched stubbornly to himself, That was Detect. I… just used Detect.

And those were the last coherent words to pass through his head. As Sneasler interposed herself between the alpha and hers, his grip on consciousness failed and he sank, gracelessly, to the ground.

At the time, it had made sense; most Pokemon in Hisui were more combative than their modern counterparts by several orders, so of course that also extended to the leaders of the pack. It would hardly come as a surprise to learn that the alphas were the only ones remembered for being so destructive due to their other outlying traits.

But apparently not. Even if a standard issue Hisuian Onix was far more forceful than its modern day cousins, it had nothing on an alpha Steelix.

Emmet had just learned that fact the hard way.

In his defense, he hadn’t had any intention of engaging with it-- he’d just miscalculated how far its territory stretched, and the Steelix had taken that personally. He’d tried backing off, but that clearly wasn’t enough of an apology.

There was a shout from the next cliff up and yes, thank you Ingo, he was well aware of the issue. It would be fine-- he wasn’t some random person wandering the Highlands without any battle experience. This was just a rather… complicated match up, that was all.

Unfortunately, none of his Pokemon were terribly well suited to the typing; Eelektross could weather the Steelix’s attacks, but none of his own moves would have any effect on it. Chandelure and Excadrill had an offensive edge, but shared a key vulnerability to ground type moves. Sending either of them out would be a risk, but all well-earned victories had an element of uncertainty.

He was backing off, about to pluck Excadrill’s pokeball from his belt, when something rammed into him from the side. Emmet was reasonably certain it wasn’t the Steelix, considering it a) was not composed of rock, b) seemed to possess limbs and c) had impacted him while he had eyes on said alpha Steelix. It took another few seconds to figure out what it was, however, by which point he’d been thrown over a shoulder while his twin bid a hasty retreat down the nearby embankment, their combined fall only slightly uncontrolled.

A pair of Hippopotas scuttled away as Ingo slid to a halt the next level down, punctuated by an exasperated, “Honestly, Emmet.”

“I had the encounter well in hand.” He automatically defended himself.

The silence stretched for a moment while Ingo regained his breath. Emmet couldn’t exactly blame him; it had been a short commute, but managing the fall down two cliff faces-- one with a passenger-- without losing speed couldn’t have been easy. At first, he thought it had just been adrenaline that made it possible, but when his brother began walking away from their landing spot without a follow up, he began to doubt that.

“You’re not going to set me down?”

He could feel the scoff before Ingo even made a sound, “A wonderful idea! I should allow you to disembark and harass the alpha Bronzong posthaste.”

“It was not on purpose!”

There was a hum, “Even worse.”

Emmet went limp, mostly as an act of protest, but also to see how it might help his situation. Without so much as altering his stride, Ingo adjusted his grip and settled his twin more firmly.

“How are you doing that.” Emmet eventually asked, once it became clear his ploy was doomed to failure.

“It’s quite intuitive. You see, I watch you do something senseless, and the words come naturally.” Ingo said, deadpan, “Impressive, when you think about it; I’d never felt the need to scold anyone prior to your arrival here.”

It was a pity he hadn’t lost that particular talent in all of this mess. In a way, it was flattering that the urge to lecture specifically Emmet had survived alongside his brother’s battling prowess and speech patterns; mostly, though, it was as annoying as it ever had been.

He braced his hands against his twin’s back, trying find enough leverage to force himself free, “That is not what I meant. How are you still carrying me so easily?”

Finally, Ingo paused in his path toward the campsite, “You’re… not that heavy.”

“I am certainly not light!”

He hummed again, and made to pick up the pace, “I’ve carried worse cargo.”

“That is verrrry impolite. We are having a discussion. Stop and set me down.”

“There’s very little to discuss when the facts are so easy to observe.” Ingo argued, but did as he’d been asked.

Emmet gave an indignant huff and righted himself, eyeing his brother in speculation. “I will prove it. You cannot weigh any more than me.”

“That isn’t precisely...” There was a pause, and Ingo turned his palms up, caving, “If you must. Just exercise caution, if you would.”

It took a moment for Emmet to work out a feasible angle of approach, lacking any reason to barrel into his twin in a panic; it wasn’t nearly as easy as Ingo had made it look, but with some effort, he managed to lift his brother the way he’d been carried prior.

“Careful,” He heard over his shoulder, “You’ll hurt your back.”

“Speaking from experience?” He eked out, unable to let the comment slide.

He was answered by an indistinct noise, and begrudgingly set him down. His back did, in fact, complain at him.

“This will not stand.” He announced, folding his arms over his chest.

Before he could go on, it was followed by, “I would appreciate it if you’d make up your mind,” as, eyes smiling, Ingo made to grab him again. He squawked and jumped back.

“Nope! No. Ingo.” Tragically, Emmet was unable to escape-- but, instead of picking him up, his twin settled for casting an arm around his shoulders.

“Fine. Enjoy it while you can. I intend to fix this disparity at the earliest convenience.”

In one sense, he was Ingo. He remembered being Ingo, thought of himself as just a part of his missing whole, and felt exactly the way he knew Ingo would. But, damningly, he also had memories of being created, of Arceus pulling him and-- of pulling him fully-formed from the ether and giving him a purpose. Humans didn’t have that.

On a fundamental level, he couldn’t be Ingo. Size discrepancies aside, Ingo was older than Emmet by three minutes, whereas he and his own twin had been crafted simultaneously.

He was Ingo, but he wasn’t. He was human, but he registered as a Pokemon. He was here to curb Emmet’s ambition, but he was also meant to take care of him. It couldn’t all be done at once.

Lately, it seemed like he’d been falling short every single one of those criteria-- but mostly the last ones. Emmet clocked the lies he told both of them as he tried to keep them chugging along, he no longer confided in him or took the time to pursue his training pet project, and actively shut him out for long nights of research and planning, preventing any wellness checks from so much as leaving the station.

It was hard. In this sense, he was still Ingo, and Ingo would have been incredibly hurt by the behavior. He loved Emmet, wanted the best for him, but the only thing he wanted was what Ingo had been created specifically to prevent.

How was he meant to stifle such a strong ideal when his being burned for nothing less than to foster it?

He lied, yes, but never to hinder. Late night snacks and reminders to rest were meant as maintenance, not distractions. He wished so dearly that he could solve the problem for Emmet, so his-- brother?-- could stop tearing himself and, potentially, the universe apart.

It wasn’t his place to judge, but wasn’t he meant to question? To challenge anything-- be it human, Pokemon or concept-- to find its highest state? Its best self?

Because-- because he couldn’t help but wonder. The real Ingo and Emmet had spent their entire lives together, and now his presence was necessitated because Arceus had separated them, but the bond between them held fast. He knew he also had a twin, but had caught little more than a glimpse before they were sent their separate ways. Had that, too, been part of Arceus’s plan? If he’d been given the opportunity to meet his other half, would he be just as desperate to reunite with him?

There were times it was all so overwhelming. The world was so much bigger than him: a vast, white space of infinite possibility, and he a deep black seed with a singular purpose. It was during those moments that he hoped beyond hope that he really was Ingo, if only a small piece. Maybe it would all make sense once put into proper perspective.

For now, though, he had a task, and Emmet was not making it simple.

Emmet’s door had been locked again, and no amount of uproar Ingo or Charjabug made could catch the attention of the man on its opposite side. Eventually-- after far too long-- he’d thought to flag down Chandelure, who’d been able to open it with Psychic, and now here he was, standing on a page next to his Hisuian doppelganger, fretting over his own ward.

With only a small semblance of awareness behind his eyes, Emmet stared at him blankly, and Ingo knew there was no use in trying to ply him with food-- not when he’d just fall asleep before it could do any good. Sighing heavily, he gave Emmet’s cheek a pat and turned to regard the reason for-- if not the source of-- all this trouble.

Ingo was in a very strange situation, caused in no small part by the fact he and the worn-looking man on the page both felt the same ways, wanted the same things. He stepped forward, mirroring the ink-and-paper copy, meeting eyes so much like Emmet’s right now: lost and empty, in spite of the wakefulness in them.

He wanted to fix this-- for both of them. He was just a tool of Arceus’s creation, it wasn’t right for him to argue against Its actions, but he wanted so dearly to make things better. It was what he’d always wanted, as long as he could remember and, simultaneously, the express purpose for his existence.

The page under his feet wrinkled ever so slightly as he turned, again, toward Emmet, reading the faint lines and dark splotches beneath his eyes, crumpling internally at the determination they represented. He felt himself crumple externally, too, and, in the interest of safety, didn’t fight it as he sank to his knees.

Behind him, the shape of a man stretched out as a shadow.

He wanted to help.

He wanted to help.

Please, just let him help.

Something in him crackled to life, thrumming uncontrollably in his core as tears silently trailed down his cheeks.

He would defy his purpose if he had to, if discarding his reason for being meant he could fulfill something so much more important. In a way, wouldn’t he succeed in both? Emmet couldn’t rend the universe apart for his twin if Ingo did it first, after all.

There was a soft noise above him, and when he looked, Emmet’s eyes were clear and wide, fixated on him. When a hesitant hand reached for him, he reached back, smoothing his own hand along the palm that curved to support him.

“It will be okay,” Ingo promised, and oh, how strange. Was there something wrong with his voice? “We will put things right again.”

As quickly as it had found him, the burst of energy faded, and he leaned into Emmet’s palm, eyes half-mast and still blurred with tears.

His stubborn ideal, however, wouldn’t be forgotten.

Maybe it was all in his head or maybe he’d lost sight of just how cold Hisui actually was, but he couldn’t think of a single exception to the rule. The feeling of another person in his arms, slotting so perfectly against him, overjoyed lavender flames, or a crowd of Pokemon eager to draw nearer-- all of it wonderfully, painlessly warm, in spite of the fact it made him feel that he might just melt.

One of the smaller joys he’d just rediscovered was a hot shower. It had been an experience, due in no small part to some lingering sense of muscle memory leading him through the process while his conscious mind marveled over every little detail. Upon absently opening a bottle of shampoo, he’d actually had to stop and steady himself against the wall, momentarily overcome with half-formed memories that he had yet to put into context.

He would ask about them in time. For now, he was dressed in new, clean, comfortable clothes and slightly in awe of how much better he felt. It was very strange. When it came down to it, it wasn’t so different from a trip to the hot springs, was it? So then why did it feel so distinct?

When he was satisfied that his hair wasn’t about to soak through the sweater he’d been provided, he hung the towel to dry and vacated the premises without so much as a glance toward the foggy mirror, hands already working through the snarls he’d created with his rough toweling. He made it a grand total of three steps out before Chandelure set upon him, taking his face in either wrought iron arm and bonking him square on the forehead with her globe. Chuckling, he bonked her back.

She stayed central in his field of vision all the way into the main living area-- only backing off when she had the room to comfortably float at his side-- and made sure to announce their arrival with an impressive promptness.

At the sound, Emmet glanced their way, standard smile turning softer, more genuine, before looking back to Crustle-- and then immediately double-taking. He uttered a quiet apology to the bug before abandoning his post and trotting over, the content smile from before taking on an edge, visibly delighting in something he’d noticed.

Taking a loose clump of mostly-dry hair in one hand, he shook the ends in Ingo’s face.

“What is this?”

Droll as he could manage, Ingo said, “If you require assistance in regards to your memory loss, I’m afraid you’ll have to seek it elsewhere.”

Emmet scrunched his nose up and flicked his wrist, letting the loose strands make contact. “You have never tolerated long hair before.”

Humming, Ingo took the bundle from his brother’s hand and went back to untangling it. “I’m not sure what you mean. It’s hardly unbearable at this length; quite easy to tie back, actually. I tried keeping it shorter for a time, but found it wasn’t worth the effort when it would reach the same station again within a fortnight. So long as it isn’t in constant contact with my neck, I have no complaint.”

Emmet echoed the hum-- looking completely unaware that he was doing any such thing-- and grabbed Ingo’s hand. Bemused, but curious enough to see where this was going, Ingo allowed himself to be herded onto the couch, sideways, where Archeops immediately curled into his lap. The cushions behind him dipped as his brother settled, too.

“You used to brush my hair for me when we were on our Pokemon journey.” Emmet told him, a hand on one shoulder to get a very specific angle. When, at the sound of his voice, Ingo automatically turned to look, he paused long enough to manually-- if lightly-- turn his twin’s head forward again, “Yours never required as much maintenance. Because you insisted on keeping it short. I made it to Mistralton before I got sick of the trouble it caused and joined you.”

For just a moment, Ingo considered the sensation of picking twigs and leaf litter out of his hair-- of how it had seemed so familiar, but just slightly to the left of what it should have been-- and resolved to revisit the thought later, when he wouldn’t be interfering with the point Emmet was trying to make.

Ironically, that very thought was interrupted by the feeling of fingers combing through his hair, working through the loose, tousled mess it had become. In a complete turnabout, it didn’t ring any bells-- distant or otherwise-- which made sense, if Emmet’s version of events was to be believed.

It was completely new, and it was shockingly wonderful.

There were notes in common with phenomena he’d experienced in Hisui-- like when a Sneasel kit got its claws stuck in his bun or Sneasler insisted on grooming him-- but it was so gently uncertain, affectionate and tentative. While he would never say he’d felt unappreciated in his service to Sneasler, he realized quite abruptly that this was what it was to be loved: to be unsure how to share it, and unable to keep from trying.

Ingo found himself holding perfectly still, so as not to interrupt; even when Emmet hit a snag and accidentally pulled just a bit too hard, he stayed quiet and motionless, focusing on the sensation with what might have been an alarmingly intense expression, had anyone been there to see his face. Fortunately, the only one in a position to witness that was Archeops, who’d long since draped his neck over Ingo’s thigh and fallen into a doze with an adorable cooing sigh.

It didn’t take terribly long to work through the tangle-- he hadn’t gone crashing through a forest in an attempt to escape the local Heracross or taken an unplanned swim in the river, after all-- but it was worth every minute. When he’d finished, Emmet hesitated and moved on to something else. Ingo’s best guess was that he was attempting a braid, and that it wasn’t going particularly well. He remained silent for another few minutes, and when the even breathing behind him gave way to a frustrated puff of air, decided to show his twin the same kindness he’d just shared.

“Have you finished?” He asked, and waited for Emmet to take the out.

There was a defeated little grumble and, after a moment, a resigned affirmative. Taking it as a cue, Ingo carefully shifted backwards, mindful not to dislodge Archeops or take Emmet by surprise.

Behind him, his brother gave a single, puzzled laugh as he was bullied back, “What are you doing?”

“This is a Sneasler custom.” He said, and while he hoped it came across as lighthearted, he was privately wary, watching for any sign that his actions were unwelcome, “Her bylaws state that grooming is to be followed by a nap; terribly sorry, but as her warden, I’m obligated to observe this protocol.”

Even if the tone didn’t carry it, Ingo knew that amusement lurked beneath the flat, “Mmhmm.” It was a very slight reassurance, and he only relaxed in full at the dull pressure against his crown, where Emmet had given up without a fight to rest his own head.

“That is unfortunate. As a Subway Boss, I have no choice but to follow the rules.”

There was a sleepy, chastising honk from Archeops’ general direction, and from there it was open season. The speed with which various Pokemon found a spot to huddle in was truly astonishing.

Ingo was home. It was warm.

No matter. The most pressing issues had been dealt with, and while it would take some time to arrive at a station approaching normalcy, it was a stop feasibly within reach.

It was odd to think that, in spite of the vacation time he’d been pressured into utilizing over the years, this might have been the first real day off Emmet had taken from the everything that required his action. Prior to this, he’d been unable to still his mind for two consecutive hours, and now that he had the chance to unwind, he felt it every minute of it.

The apartment around him was blessedly active, filled with the sounds of Pokemon socializing or playing and the occasional footfalls. There was no way to mistake it for the grief stricken stillness early on or the air of tense concern that settled in the following months. The shifting of vines and conversational chirruping fit in seamlessly amongst the minor din, as if they’d belonged there from the very beginning.

Emmet let his head fall back against the couch, methodically picking through each part of the soundscape in turn until, finally, he caught near-silent footsteps moving from linoleum to carpet, drawing ever nearer.

The sofa dipped, and he cracked one eye open.

Yup. It had all been worth it.

On the couch’s opposite arm, his twin perched, regarding him with unveiled concern. Maybe he was a bit too thin and confused, still, but he was here. One hand toyed with the cuff of the dark, clean cardigan Emmet had forced upon him, unaccustomed to the fabric overhanging his wrists, and when Ingo noticed he was being watched, he quirked the tiniest iteration of a smile this side of Castelia.

That was new, but hardly unwelcome-- as was the fact that he didn’t even try to hide it when he was upset, now. It was sad that, over the course of two and a half years, nobody had bothered learning to read him, but the end result was hilarious. He could get away with the most dead-eyed, ‘how stupid are you?’ stare in all of Unova, and nobody would be any the wiser because they didn’t think to look into anything but the curve of his lips. When Emmet stopped to think about it, nothing had even changed; such interactions had been little better than a secret kept between the two of them. He’d been able to read Ingo perfectly well before-- it was just easier than it had been back then.

In a strange way, the amnesia was similar. The instincts and knowledge bases were still there, which meant everything else was, too-- just buried, slowly rising to the surface as the days passed. The two of them would have been alright in the event that that Ingo’s memories never returned, but the prognosis was good, and in the meantime it was… fun? Emmet got to reintroduce his twin to everything he’d loved, watching the open awe as he reacted for the second first time. From the turntable in Anville Town, to the movies they’d grown up on, to something as small as a sweet treat.

Did it matter that he’d learned to tolerate the dryness of razz berries when he’d absolutely lit up at the new-but-familiar taste of a mago snack cake? What was wrong with a quieter voice when it still extolled the same ideals?

In spite of everything that could have killed him from the inside out, he was still the same person he’d always been-- still Emmet’s beloved twin brother.

Which was precisely why Emmet was so emphatically not surprised that the faint quirk of a smile was accompanied by a sympathetic, “You look incredibly tired. Why don’t you go lay down? I can ensure that everyone is taken care of while you rest.”

“That is an option,” Emmet said, and took a moment to stretch upon getting back on his feet. His spine gave a satisfying crack but, more importantly, the action lulled Ingo into a false sense of security. He circled around, ostensibly heading toward the hallway to heed the suggestion. Though there was no opportunity to catch his twin looking away, the gaze that followed him didn’t hold an ounce of suspicion, making it all the more rewarding to catch Ingo by the shoulder and shove him over onto the sofa.

“Counterpoint,” He continued, already in the process of flopping down on top of his brother, “I am fully capable of laying right here.”

“So you are.” Ingo conceded, muffled by the cardigan sleeve in his face, his arm trapped between the both of them. “Might I ask why?”

“You might. But why would you? It seems verrrry obvious to me.”

There was a full-body sigh beneath him and, deliberately, Emmet began to match the breathing pattern it gave way to; he was rewarded by the captive arm escaping and coming to rest upon his back. With the blockade gone, nothing was there to keep them apart and, in spite of the long-suffering aura he’d put up, Ingo craned to knock their heads together.

Sure, Emmet could have gone back to his room and laid down, but it wouldn’t have the effect Ingo seemed to think it might. The sounds of life would be muffled and he’d be separated from the bright air of alacrity-- what would that serve to accomplish?

No thank you. Emmet was perfectly happy right here, where-- finally-- he could rest.