By 11:51 pm, Emmet had a notebook of key details and their sources, a whopping sixty-four tabs open on his laptop and an apartment full of concerned Pokemon trying to figure out what was wrong.

It started with the photograph and Ingo’s suggestion that maybe the constellations could be used to pinpoint his location, but Emmet quickly found that he didn’t have the know-how to match stars like that; nothing looked familiar, and he couldn’t even be sure he was looking at the diagrams the right way up. If it had been his only lead, he would have kept at it, but the texts Ingo sent were a cavalcade of information.

The notepad was full of timestamps and the details they provided: things like “Seek all Pokemon”, one ‘Miss Calaba’, and even the types of Pokemon his brother mentioned, just in case that could help narrow the search radius. He’d taken note of the dates and year out of diligence, yet unsure exactly what they meant. Xtransceivers synced their internal clocks to a network, so not only would the lack of connectivity cause problems, but the fact that some unidentified Pokemon had altered Ingo’s device made Emmet think that it had malfunctioned and assigned a false year to the messages. He didn’t know how to use that, but he wanted the information on hand if and when he could.

His process was to amass the data first, and see how he could interpret it, but it was slow going; Ingo’s own understanding was limited-- reasonably so, considering he could barely even communicate with the people who’d taken him in-- and so he could only offer his own observations. His insights were inherently valuable, but not always the most pertinent. At one point, he’d sent a picture of a settlement, presumably belonging to the Shinju Clan, but instead of anything helpful, the attached message had read: You’d better appreciate that. I had to fistfight an Aipom to get that device back.

Emmet wasn’t sure if that was an exaggeration or not, and he wasn’t sure he wanted to find out either way.

He picked over both the relevant and inane to highlight those details he could use, and while they were dead ends on Ingo’s side of things, Emmet had an advantage his brother lacked: internet access. His first few search results came back in Sinnoan, which probably shouldn’t have surprised him, since Ingo mentioned colliding with the exact same language barrier. He’d tried running one article through a free translator, which only told him that had been a bad idea, and got more selective from there-- until, finally, he hit upon something.

Maybe he should have expected that it would be a Pokemon.

Ohnyula was a solid reference point. He knew the name, he knew that it was a Pokemon unique to wherever Ingo was, and he had a decent idea what it looked like. It didn’t hurt that it was also the Pokemon that had saved his brother-- and then gone on to look out for him after the fact-- so there was an extra layer of personal interest involved. He had to refine his search further and further until any resources in Unovan cropped up, which turned out to be because ‘Ohnyula’ wasn’t the species’ name, but a title in olden Sinnoan.

The species itself was called "Sneasler" and, more to the point, they had been extinct for centuries.

There were pictures, but nothing like the full color-- if blurry-- snapshot Ingo had sent; these were of poorer quality, grainy and slightly more muted, the palette limited in a way that spoke of technological constraint rather than artistic intent. The images did get the point across; Emmet was relatively certain they featured the same Pokemon, but that confirmation left him with more questions than answers.

On one hand, that seemed to limit the scope a great deal-- Ingo had been taught a term that was only used by those who knew archaic Sinnoan-- but on the other, if the species was thought to be extinct, then none of the experts knew of this one’s existence. That likely implied that, wherever Ohnyula and the Shinju Clan lived, it was incredibly remote.

Still, it was something-- and Emmet, needing a break for a few minutes, had continued scrolling through the pictures. There were only so many photographs, and the gallery was filled out by hand drawn renditions of the same Pokemon. He clicked on one in particular, trying to get a sense for how its paws worked, and then hit back before his brain processed the caption.

When he pulled it up again, it read exactly what he’d thought he’d seen: Hisuian Pokedex Circa 1X57, Laventon, H. Illustration by Ohnyula Warden Ingo.

That was the second time he’d seen a date in that range, which couldn’t be a coincidence. His second instinct, much like his first, was also denial: there was no way this illustrator could be his twin… but that wasn’t wholly true, was it? He knew better than most that there were Pokemon said to be able to cross the stream of time, native to Johto or--

Or Sinnoh.

Emmet was preparing himself for an even deeper dive into the matter when the clock struck 12:00 and his Xtransceiver began to sound again. He scrambled to find it in the disaster zone he’d created, and picked up on the third ring.

“Hello?” He asked, a touch desperately.

Sure enough, it was his brother’s voice that answered, but Ingo didn’t acknowledge the frantic greeting.

“You’re not going to get the messages. At least, not for very, very long time. I spoke with-- there’s a man here who--” He broke off in the middle of the sentence, frustrated, and didn’t respond when Emmet called his name.

He wasn’t really there. This was exactly what he’d said up top: a message received well after the fact. Emmet felt his heart sink, but just after, his most recent discovery came back to slap him in the face. It was an old message, but how old? Just two years, or…?

Ingo continued on, irregardless of anything and everything happening on his brother's end of the line.

“In theory, I may be able to find passage to Unova from here. It won’t matter, though. You’re not there yet. This… this will be the Sinnoh region someday in the far future, but today, it’s Hisui.”

It hurt. The confirmation, yes, but it hurt to hear his brother echo the exact thought patterns he'd traveled: 'it couldn't be a coincidence' that he'd been displaced just as Laventon was trying to compile a Pokedex, his presence in Hisui 'limited the scope' of the task he'd been given, down from a theoretically infinite number of Pokemon. For a moment, they were on exactly the same page again, and then the circumstances hit home, and they were hundreds of years apart.

Ingo was trying, though. He’d promised to help Professor Laventon with his Pokedex, thereby ‘seeking out all Pokemon’, and Emmet had already seen evidence suggesting that he’d followed through.

He hastily jotted down Laventon – Hisui Pokedex in conjunction with the most recent message, and then glanced to the call log again. There were more messages, and as tempted as he was to let them play while he worked-- if for no other reason than to hear his brother talking to himself in the background-- he wanted to give them his full focus, so they would have to wait, just a little bit longer. Important though they were, there was something he needed to follow up on while it was fresh in mind.

When he searched Hisuian Pokedex Circa 1X57, Laventon, the results were overwhelmingly Sinnoan, but there were a few he could actually read. The one he picked out was an overview of what historians considered the first proper Pokedex-- or, more accurately, the first Pokedex that a modern audience would recognize. It had been a collaborative project headed by a ‘Galaxy Team’ and then put into order by the lead researcher, one Professor Laventon.

Supposedly, in his foreword, he listed the surveyors who’d lent their time and effort to the cause, and specifically cited that the Pokedex in its final form would have been impossible to create without the contributions of the Pearl Clan’s Warden Ingo-- going on to state that, whatever endeavors his friend had gone onto, Laventon hoped he had enjoyed their collaboration, too.

So… he’d done it. Ingo had sought out every Pokemon in the Hisui region, and then-- if this article was to be believed-- moved on. Presumably, that meant he’d been trying to make good on his promise, but he wasn’t home yet. Had something else happened? Was something preventing him from following through?

Emmet reached for his Xtransceiver again, and while he knew he wouldn’t have any better luck this time, he tried to return one of the calls he’d ‘missed’. As usual, it rang and rang and rang before switching over to Ingo’s own pre-recorded message.

He almost hung up, satisfied-- if disappointed-- with that result, but… but just in case, maybe he should…

“I got your messages. If you get mine… sorry. I was angry. I don’t really believe any of that. Love you. Bye.”

As he hit the ‘end call’ button, he stared down at his Xtransceiver, contemplative. He knew where this was headed, now, but there was still plenty he didn’t understand. How, for one, but the odds that Ingo ‘currently’ possessed any insight into the matter and hadn’t already shared it were slim to none.

He would have to go along for the ride, to identify a track forward and find out how his brother had become affiliated with the Pearl Clan, Sneasler and Galaxy Team.

Scribbling down his latest thoughts, Emmet settled himself in for the long haul.