Emmet supposed the day’s tone had really been set when their mother called, as she did every year, and instead of a standard greeting, was met by:

“You have my sincerest apologies.”

The angle of Lane’s eyes didn’t know whether to be sympathetic or amused as she said, “You’re both forgiven and worth it. Happy birthday, boys.”

He’d been entertained more than he’d been suspicious, which, in hindsight, was also part of a theme.

While any actual plans varied year by year, dependent on the schedules involved, the one thing that was always tied to late September was a trip to the regional fair before it packed up for the year. It had been an occasion since they were kids, when they’d met up with Elesa and taken the day off from adventuring to goof around, and it was a habit they’d yet to break. The timing could be a little tricky, but that was made up for in how local it was.

One would think there would be some semblance of competition, set up right across the water from Nimbasa’s amusement park, but it was actually quite friendly, the presence of one boosting the other’s revenue. It wasn’t uncommon to see people ferried across the way in either direction on the backs of Swanna or Lapras.

The fair itself wasn’t anything particularly special-- if you’d attended once, you knew roughly what you were in for-- but it was always fun to mill about and get some snacks and watch the rotating expo of acts, or fail spectacularly at a few games.

Inevitably, they always wound up at the battlegrounds, living vicariously through the inexperienced trainers.

“What are we thinking, you two? Is this round gonna go to Maractus or Whimsicott?” Elesa asked, leaning against the rail separating spectators from the field.

If Maractus had Chlorophyll, it would be able to outpace Whimsicott, if only barely. If it didn’t, however, it would lag far, far behind, which was a problem with its mediocre defenses. It would be in a decent spot with special attack, since Whimsicott was more of a physical defender, but its best match up was Pin Missile-- a physical move-- and to add insult to injury, it was softened from super effective to standard by the fairy typing. Both in terms of defense and offense, Whimsicott held the edge.

“Whimsicott.” He said, and at the same time, on her other side, he heard, “Maractus, I would say.”

...seriously?

He leaned backwards, looking past Elesa’s shoulders to shoot his brother an incredulous look. In what world would Maractus be able to weather Hurricane long enough to wear Whimsicott down with bug and grass moves?

“Whimsicott is either borrowed or newly obtained. It doesn’t trust that trainer yet.” Ingo said, seemingly unaware of the attention being leveled at the back of his head. “Did you see their opponent drumming along to Maractus’s rhythm? They’re far more in sync with one another, and the trainer’s not worried in the slightest. There must be a reason for that.”

Well… okay, he guessed. Disobedient Pokemon weren’t really a factor they had to deal with on the Battle Subway-- not where challengers were concerned, at least. Some of the subway trainers had a difficult time with it now and then, but he couldn’t remember anyone ever directing that particular question to him. He knew Ingo had helped a couple of trainers with it once or twice.

This was one area where their battle expertise differed. Emmet was more one for textbook information and raw data. Ingo, ironically, was quite good at cold reading. It worked fairly well given their preferred battle styles; there wasn’t much room to pay attention to four Pokemon on the battlefield and try to interpret your opponent’s expression, but in singles, it was worth it to read into the little details… which put Ingo’s opponents in a tough spot, but his stoic expression caused enough grief in other facets of day to day life that Emmet figured it evened out. It was a matter of inbound and outbound trains.

Sure enough, Whimsicott didn’t make use of its superior speed, instead floating around leisurely and using moves as it saw fit. Spiky Shield wasn’t able to inflict damage in return, but it kept Maractus safe from the super effective hits, and its physical attack was enough to let its secret weapon-- Poison Jab-- make a decent dent.

It was entirely possible that Hurricane might have connected if Whimsicott had kept at it, sweeping Maractus now that it had taken a solid Moonblast, but its trainer grew frustrated and called it back.

Disappointing.

Disappointing enough to wander away from the arena entirely and see what else the fair had to offer this year.

The instant they drew even with a particular vendor, Elesa was off like a shot, dead set on the absurdly sugary lemonade that was sold there, inexplicably distributed in cup shaped like an Elgyem. Emmet could only imagine how many she owned by now; there was a ceiling of thirteen-- about to become fourteen-- but somehow he doubted she’d kept the ones from a decade prior between multiple moves.

With Elesa indisposed, Emmet’s attention fell to the last remaining member of their little wandering group; his twin was busy spacing out, staring over the water. Truly, Ingo knew how to make the most of a day at the fair. By second nature, Emmet waved a hand directly in front of his face, and was immediately slapped away.

“Can I help you?” Ingo asked, more flustered than annoyed.

“You are thinking too hard. The fair does not require that much concentration.” He realized his mistake at the same time that his brother made to speak, and abruptly held a hand up, cutting him off, “Catching rubber Duckletts is the exception.”

Ingo rolled his eyes, but let him get away with it.

Because he couldn’t leave well enough alone, he went on to ask, “You were thinking about them again, weren’t you?”

“It’s difficult not to.” Ingo admitted, following it with a short, succinct shake of his head, “There’s no sense going into it here; it’s better saved for once we’re back home, or another day entirely.”

That was probably wise. The very public regional fair wasn’t the place to discuss an unwanted pregnancy unless one was a specific kind of person, and neither of them fell into that extremely limited category.

To get away from the topic, Emmet physically removed the both of them from where they’d been idling, leading his brother by a wrist further into the maze of stalls.

“Not nauseated right now, correct?” He asked, to an affirmative. Taking it as an all clear, he headed toward an understated, sun bleached storefront; it was the same from when they’d been kids-- if, perhaps, a bit paler now than in the years past-- and, while the faces behind it changed, the items on offer never did. That was just another part of the yearly ritual; Elesa got her battery acid, and the two of them solicited this stand for a soft pretzel or funnel cake.

When he next glanced over, he caught Ingo looking over his shoulder-- towards the water again-- and shoved the latter item at his brother so he could toss a hand up. “What is it? Is there something over there?”

He saw the usual Wingull circling above, but nothing that would mandate that kind of attention.

“...don’t laugh?”

Emmet shrugged, doubtful that it would be anything warranting the light blush, but also unwilling to lock himself out of the potential to poke fun; that seemed to be good enough for Ingo, who began guiding them in that direction. He wasn’t sure how they picked Elesa up on the way, but she found them with a surprising efficacy.

“Huh.” Emmet said, once they’d reached the destination. “Good idea.”

Elesa, having not sworn an oath against mockery, asked, “Why are we looking at a war crime?”

Ingo made absolutely no move to defend himself, head ducked slightly in embarrassment, and turned to focus on Emmet instead their resident food critic, “Did you want one?”

He nodded decisively and moved to hold onto the funnel cake while his brother went to order.

“Right.” Elesa said, eyeing the bright red pickles being advertised with distaste and, as Ingo had before her, turned it to Emmet, “He gets a pass because he’s temporarily insane. You’re sterile. What’s your excuse?”

“I am Emmet. I am a man of culture.”

She scoffed, “Bacteria culture, maybe.”

He elected to ignore that. To a point. There might have been a link between the sass and a minute later, when he made pointed eye contact with her upon biting into a pickle. Elesa’s instinct to turn for backup was stymied when she remembered whose idea this had been in the first place.

“Dragons help me, there’s two of him.” She said, dramatically tossing her head back and pinching the bridge of her nose.

With a special kind of mirth that wrapped all the way back around to sounding legitimately concerned, Ingo asked, “Are you only just noticing that?”

They milled about the fairgrounds from that point on, weaving through folk art displays, handicrafts and, as always, trying to make sense of the ubiquitous spa salesman. Nobody had expected the last point of interest to also be one of the most entertaining, but it seemed he either hadn’t sanitized his equipment properly, or someone had gotten it into their head to play a mean spirited trick on him, because the greater portion of his displays had been infested with Dewpider hatchlings.

Any amusement to be derived from his situation was cut short as it became clear that, instead of dealing with Pokemon properly, he intended to nudge them out into the water-- but became worth it again to see the look on his face at the booming rebuke sent his way.

A sudden influx of a tropical water type could easily disrupt the local Basculin population, which wouldn’t stand. Strictly speaking, none of them were responsible for anything approaching environmental rule enforcement, but as public figures with some degree of authority, it only felt right to ensure that the Dewpider made it into safe hands.

Being part of the bug egg group, they would be an asset to a number of local breeders-- or just enthusiasts-- who Emmet knew would take proper care of them, so it wasn’t especially difficult to find them new homes. It drew a fair amount of unwanted attention to the source, however, and the salesman couldn’t wait to be rid of the bugs and the three of them.

It did mean that they ended up departing the fairground substantially later than any of them had anticipated, putting a crimp in further plans. That was fine; they would be able to meet up any number of times throughout the week. The important thing was that they’d seen the fair before it shut down.

And uh. Maybe they’d shut down a part of the fair, themselves.

They’d see next year, Emmet guessed.

There was no attempt to pick up the thread of conversation from earlier once they got home, but since Ingo had gone out of the way to include ‘another day’ in the list of possibilities, it seemed likely that he’d never intended to revisit it this evening. That sounded like something he’d do. They both appreciated a clear divide between work and off days, after all-- needed it, even, to maintain a healthy balance-- and Emmet felt relatively sure anything pertaining to the pregnancy counted as work.

If they weren’t addressing it tonight, and the Pokemon-- including the spiderling cozying up to Galvantula-- were content, then there was only one more order of business to attend to before the day was allowed to draw to a close.

On a knee in the kitchen, using the table as cover, Emmet secured a crisply-wrapped parcel to Durant’s back; it was just about time for its nightly patrol, and there was no question where that would lead. Once he was confident that it wouldn’t fall off mid-transit, he released the ant to do as it would and headed for his own bedroom as usual, so he might be able to observe without giving the game away.

He paused just prior to entry, plucking up the extra appropriate bug-patterned gift bag from the handle before admitting himself. Without disrupting the ribbon tying the handles together, he peeked in and smiled, but set it aside for later.

Across the hall he heard Ingo greet Durant, and inched to where he could see his brother do a double-take before abandoning his nightly ritual to pick the bug up. Without a shred of hesitation, he raised his head to stare directly into the dark room, and Emmet lurking inside.

He cracked, laughing, and set Durant down on his bed before moving to linger in the doorway. “Good night, Emmet. Happy birthday.”

“You too! Happy birthday!”