Neither Ingo nor Emmet paid too much attention to social media. Certainly, they used it to promote the station or stay in contact with faraway associates, but it wasn’t something either of them did for fun.

So neither of them noticed when #zorua began to trend.

It came up, tangentially, in the downtime between end of one battle and the next– one of Emmet’s challengers briefly addressing the topic with the friend she’d brought for moral support– but whatever the news was, it had all day to circulate before either of the twins looked into it.

And circulate it did. It came up no fewer than four separate times on the doubles train– three on the singles– and, by the end of the day, it had Emmet curious enough to investigate. While Ingo was busy with the last few forms before their shift ended, he tapped away at his Xtransceiver, trying to figure out what in the world was going on.

The first few images loaded. He blinked at them, uncertain he was seeing correctly, but the image stayed static.

“These are photographs of a Hisuian Zorua.” He announced.

There was a long pause, Ingo’s hands stilling over the evening’s paperwork, and, eventually, he said, “…I beg your pardon?”

Wordlessly, Emmet turned the screen so his brother could see, and Ingo spent another few seconds studying it.

“That looks…” He trailed off, brows furrowed, and his eyes dropped back to the paperwork without actually seeing it.

With no ending forthcoming, Emmet concluded the thought for him and tilted the device back to where he could scroll further down, “Like the Icelands. Correct.”

[that tech didn’t exist outside of the village, which was a static studio]

“Then you won’t be happy to hear that those are stills from a video.” He said, eyes locked on the screen as he read further, “It seems they’ve recovered a device remarkably similar to the one Akari carried.”

This time, Ingo didn’t wait, coming around to Emmet’s side to peer over his shoulder. “Oh. I’d… completely forgotten about that.”

Emmet shot him a questioning look and, silently, he nodded. It had been his for a very brief amount of time, long, long ago. Given everything else that had slipped his mind at the time, the fact that this had fallen by the wayside until now was hardly a surprise.

[…]

[He checks his own Xtransceiver, finally, and realizes that there are messages from friends who recognized the circumstance/his voice in the full clip. Begins to panic]

“It’s currently 7:06– no, 7:07 pm. I’m hoping to document some wild Pokemon using this strange device–”

“Emmet.”

His twin hummed an acknowledgment, smile turning fond as the past version of Ingo marveled at the sights around him.

“I think you should stop the video playback.”

Emmet glanced up out of the corner of his eye, puzzled, and then shifted his attention entirely as the look on his brother’s face processed. Blindly, he reached over to pause the clip, interrupting Ingo’s [infodump] on the matter of Snorunt’s eating habits.

“Something happened to you in the Alabaster Icelands. You think your device captured it.”

“No, I’m positive that it did. [Has multiple messages from peripherally aware people going ‘this u?’ and Elesa, who’s in the know, freaking out about him having been attacked].”

—

[Much later. Reluctantly, Ingo decides he needs to see the clip to understand the context of what he’s being asked/what he can plausibly deny if need be. Isn’t asking Emmet to watch with him, necessarily, but of course he does.]

Emmet’s grip on his hand tightened, ever so slightly. At the stillness that followed, Ingo allowed himself to lean further into his brother’s side. “If there’s something you want to say, I’m listening.”

[long pause]

“I am… verrry grateful this footage was not discovered sooner.” / “If it had surfaced while you were missing…”

[…]

[it wasn’t the zoroark attack that wiped his memory– that was an unrelated incident]

“Ingo. I think Arceus may hate you.”

The bluntness of the statement caught Ingo off guard, and he huffed a laugh. “After everything that happened, I’m relatively certain it hates us both.”

“Then it will have to dispose of us as a unit.” / “I would like to see it try.”