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People were quick to care about Ingo's disappearance. Iris still recalled the constant barrage of news stories that broke with the first few hours of the announcement. There was even a point when she couldn't turn on the television without seeing her missing cousin's face plastered on every other channel. Emmet was also front and center as well, spreading awareness of the case just as much. With all eyes across Unova on the lookout, everyone was confident that Ingo would be found soon. Except, that's not what happened.
A year later, and after no real leads whatsoever, The Nimbasa Sun decided to run a special update piece on the case. Iris had managed to sneak a reading of the magazine, despite the fact that her dad had already made his feelings loud and clear.
"I will not allow such trash to stand! Disrespecting my family, and in my own home! How dare they!"
She had heard Drayden shout as he slammed down the advanced copy he had been sent. He was already in the other room calling his lawyer, so he didn't notice as Iris slipped into the living room and then back up the stairs to her bedroom. Her Axew tilted his head to the side as she quickly locked the door behind her. While she highly doubted her dad would just walk in without knocking, she knew that he was kind of flustered at the moment, and this magazine was the reason why.
Iris sat on her bed, the magazine laid out in front of her. Already, she could feel her stomach drop as she read the cover.
Murder on the Nimbasa Express???
Experts Weigh in on Prevailing Theories Regarding the "Mysterious" Disappearance of the Beloved Black Subway Boss. More on pg 4.
She hastily began to read the article. It started off innocuous enough, just a recap of Ingo's early career, some broad facts about his case, nothing that wasn't already public knowledge. Iris felt herself release a small breath. Perhaps it really wasn't that bad? Tensions had been running high with the anniversary on the horizon, so it was possible that her dad was simply overreacting. Drayden was known for being a bit of a hothead at times, especially when it concerns their family. He probably just skimmed the title and didn't appreciate the implications brought about by the wordplay. Still, despite how much she tried to reassure herself, Iris couldn't relax. Her shoulders were stiff as she turned the page. A large picture of Ingo was on display, a professional portrait taken by the city upon his installation as a Subway Boss, and placed right beside it was a grainy photograph of Emmet. Iris's breath unintentionally hitched as she caught sight of her other cousin.
While Ingo looked frozen in time upon the moment of his disappearance, the same couldn't be said for Emmet. His hair was sloppily spilling out from underneath the side of his uniform cap, while a noticeable layer of facial hair had begun to set in. A couple of Joltik were also crawling along the sleeve of his coat. He was giving a tense smile to the camera, and Iris wondered if he had been caught by surprise when the photo was taken.
"...while not concrete, and hard evidence is still difficult to come by, it's impossible to ignore the coincidences..."
Iris's brows knitted at the quote. The fact that Emmet was the last person to see Ingo and that his story was so "flimsy" apparently constituted as a smoking gun to the so-called experts. Never mind the actual facts of the matter, like how Emmet was practically in hysterics while the police were first questioning him, or how there was no signs of any type of struggle, or blood, or anything other than a set of footprints that stopped in the middle of the tunnel while Emmet's kept going all the way back to the station. Ingo's Pokémon also had absolutely no ill will towards Emmet, which would be surprising if he had done anything to their trainer. Not that Iris ever believed for a second that Emmet could be capable of harming Ingo!
She read a little further, scoffing as they brought up Emmet's more odd personality quirks like that could possibly have any bearing. Emmet always smiled, and he made it "verrrrry" clear that he was going to keep doing so no matter what. He wore his smile under the guise of refusing to give up hope. However, Iris wondered if there was something more to it. As far back as she could remember, Emmet had always been the more emotionally charged twin. It was commonplace for him to take a perceived slight against him just a bit too personally, or for him and her dad to butt heads worse than a pair of Cranidos.
It was a long time ago, but Iris could still hear him screaming all about how "You do not understand, Uncle Drayden! It is not a phase! This is who I am!"
And her dad then responded in kind with "What, a hooligan? With all that makeup on you might as well call yourself a harlequin! Maybe you just can't hear me underneath all those ridiculous piercings! Although, with that many holes in your ears you would think that something would actually make it into that stubborn head of yours-"
"Dragons, you are insufferable!"
"Do not take the names of the twin dragons in vain in my household!"
"Actually, I was thinking of converting. I even got this verrrrry interesting flyer the other day for something called...Gir-a-tina? Maybe I will go and join that cult!"
"You little heretic! Get back here, we're not done speaking!"
"Why not? I have nothing else to say to you!"
Emmet eventually stormed off to his bedroom, slamming the door behind him. Iris soon heard music blasting out from the other side. Drayden looked as though he was ready to go strangle Emmet then and there. Instead, he went out back to wrestle with his Pokémon. Being so young, Iris couldn't possibly comprehend the complexity of her dad and cousin's relationship. All she knew for sure was that her dad and Ingo never argued about his clothes, and that Drayden picked out all of her clothes so they didn't argue either. Iris didn't like to see anyone in her family fighting. When Ingo finally got home from a late class, Iris cornered her oldest cousin for some answers.
"Go-Go," she pouted, "how come Daddy doesn't like Emmy's clothes?"
Ingo silently blinked, before realization crossed his eyes.
"Ah, I take it that they have been arguing again?"
Iris nodded. "They was really loud."
"I would imagine so," Ingo told her with a knowing sigh. "Do not fret, Iris. I am certain that Emmet and Uncle will be able to patch things up soon. They always manage to do so."
"But why do they keep yelling?" Iris huffed. "It's not nice."
"I suppose no, it is not nice to witness." Ingo put a hand on her shoulder and got down on his knees. "I am sure that you are aware that a train cannot run without tracks. Before you were born, back when Uncle first took us in after we had lost our parents, he believed himself to be our track. He wants to take us down the path to what is best for us. But, sometimes I believe that he forgets that tracks can split. We will all get to our destination on schedule. Emmet just might be following a different schedule and taking another route than what Uncle intended for him. Maybe one day he will come to understand that Emmet is the conductor of his own train car. Until then, I suppose that the only thing that the two of us can do is to be supportive of Emmet's choices. I am sure that he would appreciate it."
Iris didn't exactly understand the metaphor (she never understood much when they talked about trains), but she got the message. Looking back, however, announcing to the whole dinner table how she wants to look "just as pretty as Emmy" when she grew up probably wasn't the type of support Ingo had meant. All it did was cause her dad to threaten to feed Emmet to Salamence.
By the time she had finished reading the article, Iris could hardly contain her rage.
"How dare they!"
She threw the offending magazine against the far wall. Sensing his trainer's anger, her Axew abandoned his place nestled within her hair and crawled onto her shoulder. Iris let out a sigh.
"I'm sorry, Chewie. It's just, where do they get off writing those things about Emmet? Those hurtful, awful, lies."
Iris felt as though she might throw up. She pulled her knees up to her chest and began to cry. Tears fell for both of her cousins, and for the first time since the day the twins had originally moved away, Iris grieved for the loss of her family. After she had collected herself, Iris carried Chewie down to the kitchen for a glass of water. Her dad was still on the phone with his lawyer, the two of them going over the details of some sort of cease and desist order. Unfortunately, it didn't seem to be going his way. Iris winced at Drayden's shouting, prompting her to return back to her room quickly after putting the magazine back on the table where he had originally left it.
Iris attempted to put the article out of her mind as she scrolled through her X-trans. Still, there wasn't enough funny Purrloin videos on the entire internet to lift her mood. The photo of Emmet lingered in the foreground of her thoughts. He hadn't looked so bad the last time she had seen him, right? Iris racked her head, trying to remember the last time she actually had seen her cousin. Drayden had floated the idea of a get together for his birthday next month, but after last year Emmet had been rather insistent about not celebrating until Ingo was found. Iris could understand. Besides, twenty-nine wasn't exactly that important of birthday year in the grand scheme. She still wanted to send him a card though. Other than that, any interactions had been exclusively in the form of straight to the point text messages. Again, Iris couldn't blame Emmet. Without Ingo there, Emmet had taken on the full burden of running the entire Nimbasa City subway system. Not to mention the Battle Sub as well. That sort of workload doesn't exactly allow for much in the way of vacation time.
Ingo used to always be the one to plan their trips home anyway. Before his disappearance, Ingo was sort of the glue holding the two sides of the family together. Elesa and the twins just lived so far away from her and Drayden, and everyone was so busy with their respective lives, it made it hard to remain close. Iris had only been seven when they all left home for Nimbasa City, and they were already well established in their places by the time she set out on her journey four years later. Of course, the three of them were highly supportive of her efforts as a Pokémon trainer, and it was probably the first time that she was able to forge a true connection to her cousins now that they had battling in common. And, just like that, it was gone. It really does figure. As soon as Iris got the relationship that she had always dreamed of with her cousins, one where they finally saw her on equal footing as a real person and not just an annoying little kid, it gets snatched away from her grasp.
Her finger lingered over Emmet's contact. However, instead of opening up their old message chat, Iris pressed the call button instead. Each second she was left unanswered caused Iris's resolve to waver, but after only three rings Emmet's face appeared on the screen. He wasn't exactly looking at the camera, and Iris could hear quite a lot of background noise.
"I am Emmet. If you are calling about the Joltiks, please note that I am verrrrry sorry. I did not realize the potential far reaching consequences of my endeavor, as have been helpfully pointed out to me by the city's officials. I apologize for any inconveniences, or city wide power outages, that might have been the result of my breeding efforts. Rest assured that I have since scaled back my operations indefinitely."
Iris scrunched her nose at the clearly pre written statement. It sounded an awful lot like something that the family lawyer would have drafted.
"Seriously, Emmet?" She shook her head. "Didn't Dad warn you about that already?"
Emmet blinked before finally realizing who he was talking to.
"Oh! Iris. I was not expecting a call from you," he smiled. "Has something happened?
Again, Iris shook her head. "No, we're alright."
She watched as a bit of tension left Emmet's form. "That is good to know. I have to get back to work now-"
"Wait!" Iris winced at the sharpness of her tone. "I mean...I was thinking of going to Nimbasa sometime next month. You know, do a bit of shopping and what not, so I was thinking we could hang out. Elesa should be back from Kalos by then too, right?"
Emmet nodded. "I will try to make some time. However, I do not expect it to be easy. I am verrrrry busy."
"That's fine. Dad's been letting up on the gym leader training lately, so my schedule is pretty flexible. Maybe we can even go catch the latest Brycen-Man movie! Or we could see a musical, I haven't been to one since I was on my journey!"
"Yes, yes, that all sounds great," he told her in a rather dismissive tone. "I will see you then."
"Okay." Iris took a deep breath, "I just, I wanted to tell you that I'm here if you ever need anything."
Emmet blinked, and Iris thought she saw his smile waver for a split second-
"Dully noted. Thank you for the call."
-Then again, it might have just been a delay in the video.
"Yeah, well...bye, Emmet."
The call was cut then shortly after. Iris fell back against her pillow, feeling more akin to having run a marathon rather than just calling her cousin. Beside her, Chewie let out a concerned whine. Slowly, she pulled the Axew into her arms.
"The only thing we can do is to be supportive," she told the Pokémon.
Iris found Ingo's words rang hollow as soon as they left her mouth. For as little as they had talked, Iris could still tell just how much of a wreck Emmet had become over the past year. He might not have read the article yet, but Emmet was going to be in for a harsh surprise when he learned just how much of a guilty light that the public cast him in. Emmet was going to need support more than ever then. However, much like with that incident dinner all those years ago, Iris wasn't sure that she'd be able to give him the right kind. She wasn't Ingo.
The hypocrite that he was for leaving Emmet and the rest of them all as gutted as a Fraxure that lost its tusks-
Iris immediately stopped herself. It (probably) wasn't Ingo's fault that he had disappeared, and the last thing she should be doing is blaming him for it. Still, the longer he remained missing, the harder it became for Iris to just continue on without knowing anything. While it was unfair to believe that she was more entitled to an answer than anyone else (especially Emmet), Iris hoped that any information could help to stem the sense of resentment that had been growing within her. She didn't want to hate her cousin. She DIDN'T hate him! It was just...she had been forced to watch as Emmet crumbled before her, and something told her that he was only going to continue to get worse. That, she decided, was something that she did hold Ingo responsible for. Even if it was unintentional.
Iris traveled to Nimbasa City a few weeks later. Elesa excitedly spent the day with her, and they did all of Iris's favorite activities. Emmet did not join them. He told her that he was simply too under the weather to do anything other than his job, while Elesa alluded to the magazine article (along with several others that came out in the interim) having been responsible for his recent lack of public appearances. Iris wanted to push the subject further, but she decided to hold her tongue. Emmet probably just wanted some space in order to "cool his engines" like when he was younger.
Iris left for home early the next morning, resolved to make more of an effort to connect with her cousin once this whole thing blew over. After all, he knew that she was there for him. That was all that she could do for him.
People were slow to care when Emmet went missing. There was only a single news report on the first day.
The police went looking for him at Drayden's request after he failed to answer a single one of his calls. Especially when it became apparent that Emmet hadn't been answering ANYONE'S calls. While the officer was reluctant to perform a wellness check on a grown man who likely just forgot to charge his X-trans again, Drayden could be rather persuasive over the phone. One mention of a lawsuit was enough to spur them into action. Iris had made herself busy by caring for Emmet's newly arrived Pokémon. In all honesty, she was surprised he had relinquished them with so little fuss. He had been barred from the Battle Sub, not battling entirely.
She was in the middle of feeding them all lunch when she heard her father swear. The curse seemed to echo throughout the house, cutting through the air like a Sonic Boom move. Iris nearly dropped the bag of food, and she was left frozen in place, trying to process what she had just heard. Drayden never ever took the twin dragons' names in vain like that.
It wasn’t the last time that she caught him doing it.
After his apartment had been found empty and without any clues (sans a half drunken cup of coffee, and that his subway boss uniform also missing) the police instantly changed their Kricketune about the whole thing. However, instead of the typical missing persons case, like they had filed for Ingo, Emmet was instead labeled "a danger to themselves or others". Iris had argued against this, but Drayden strangely accepted the police's decision.
When the news finally broke, speculation went wild. It seemed that the media had specifically ramped up production in order to make up for lost time and to capitalize on the public's frenzy. After a month, it seemed every Pokémart checkout line was filled with Emmet's face. Except, it wasn't concern that was written in their pages. Two theories prevailed overall, neither of which Iris believed for a second.
One had to do with whatever incident had occurred on his birthday (Iris wasn't privy to anymore details than the rest of the public, as Drayden's lawyer had drafted quite an airtight NDA that was signed by everyone involved). All she knew was there was some sort of alteration with a passenger that prompted Emmet to "take a paid leave of absence" in order to recover. Apparently, the lack of free knowledge about it had led to much conjecture as to the role it played in Emmet's disappearance.
The second theory fell back on the almost two years of slander that he had been forced to endure. It seemed that plenty were under the assumption (or rather delusion in Iris's opinion) that Emmet felt guilty for what happened to Ingo (As if he played any part in that whatsoever!) and just couldn't take it any longer. Why anyone would think that Emmet could simply leave without telling his family anything on purpose was beyond Iris. He wouldn't dare put them all through that again.
Iris was there when the Police Chief of Nimbasa City met with Drayden in their home. It had already been nearly three months with no new evidence, and this was all starting to feel a bit too much like how it went when Ingo first disappeared. They had already discussed the fact that there had been no witnesses, nothing caught on any cameras, no reports from any citizens, and none of his credit cards had been used the entire time.
"I understand that this is never easy to hear, but generally when it's taken this long to find a body..."
Static filled Iris's head as she looked at her father in horror. Surely, he would be the one to correct the man! However, as the conversation continued on unabated, Drayden only gave an occasional silent nod to show that he was still listening. That's when it finally struck her.
They weren't looking for Emmet. They were never looking for him. They were looking for his body.
The taste of her breakfast mixed with bile in the back of Iris's throat. At some point, her father put his hand on her shoulder and gave a light squeeze.
"Iris, you look so pale. Perhaps, you should go lie down?"
It wasn't a suggestion, and Iris took the out with a minor sense of gratitude. She definitely didn't want to hear anymore. After she had retreated to her bedroom, Iris immediately curled up on her bed and began to cuddle with Chewie. Tears streamed down her face as she let out several strangled sobs. How blind had she been this entire time?
Behind that smile, Emmet must have been in so much pain! While she didn't know exactly what had led to her father taking custody of Emmet's Pokémon, she did catch Drayden complaining about an escalation in Emmet's recent "self destructive" behaviors. She naively believed it was in reference to the usual impulsive tendencies that caused Emmet to self-sabotage.
What else could she have missed? Iris thought back to her most recent conversation with her cousin (she would have never guessed that they would be their last), over analyzing every single word she said to him.
"I just, I wanted to tell you that I'm here if you ever need anything."
Iris had told him that, and she meant it. She wanted to think that he had believed her, but now it just felt like she was kidding herself. She didn't know what to think anymore. All she knew was that both of her cousins were gone, and it seemed that she would never know why. Well, at least for one of them. There wasn't a single point when the prevailing sentiment was that they expected to find Ingo's body. Emmet wouldn't let them even entertain the idea that Ingo was anything but alive. And so, for almost two and a half years, that's what they've all been going with.
And yet, after only two and a half months, they had already written off Emmet as a troubled man who simply had one too many bad days. No one was advocating for him. Iris took a deep breath, letting her body shudder as she attempted to reel in the worst of her emotions. Emmet didn't deserve to be treated like this! She had heard the police chief say that there was no note, and while that likely meant little in the long run, Iris clung to it like a life preserver. There was a reason she had never considered such an outcome in Emmet's case before. For all his impulsiveness, and emotional reactions, and everything else that seemed to point towards that as a single conclusion, Iris couldn't believe that Emmet would kill himself.
Until the day she herself saw his lifeless body as it was lowered into the ground, Iris refused to accept that he was anything other than missing. And, just like he had done for Ingo, it was up to Iris to hold onto the hope that he would come home one day. Somebody had to.