Pokémon: Out of the Woods | A Galar, Unova & Sinnoh Fanfiction

Chapter 28: The Attic

Pidove tweeted outside an old home in Opelucid City. They scattered as a Togekiss landed. Boots hit the pavement. A woman in a swishing pink coat stepped off. Passersby smiled and greeted her. She smiled back, but there was a haunting absence in her grey eyes. Perhaps it was the months she was trapped on the Plasma Frigate, or perhaps it was a reflection of the void in her father's soul since Ingo disappeared.

Syntyche never married after that experience with Noah Alnwick. She went on a few dates, but she knew she would only ever lead lovers on, because she would never trust them enough to love or even want them. Besides, trying to weed out the ones who were only interested in her money, or prestige as an Elite Four member, was too exhausting. She didn't have the time or energy.

She rang the doorbell. Her father, Emmet, was 99. Since he had to buy a walking frame and his Pokémon began to pass away, she urged him to bolt the door shut when he was alone. Despite his failing health and the hole in his soul where his beloved twin brother once was, he never failed to smile when she got home.

'Hi! How was your day?'

'All good. Same old.'

'Good, good.'

Ingo's cap still hung on a coat peg. Emmet dusted it, but after years in the sun, it was faded. One of Ingo's children felt that she had no choice but to move on. Her father was never coming back. Though she was no longer even on the same planet, because she piloted a mission to Mars and remained there, she still seemed closer than the increasingly blurry memories of her father.

Her younger brother, Illtyd, was the opposite. He and Winter, his wife, lived there with Emmet and Syntyche, but Illtyd had always been so consumed by the futile search for his father that it sometimes seemed as if he, too, was gone. At first, he studied Criminology and joined the International Police. When the last Team Plasma investigation concluded with no sign of Ingo, he resigned and returned to university to study Astrophysics, suspecting that his father was sucked into an Ultra Wormhole. Winter and their kids encouraged him to pursue his ideals, so he even spent several years in Alola, studying at the Dimensional Research Lab.

He knew everything there was to know about Ultra Wormholes. It brought him no closer to finding Ingo. Understanding Ultra Wormholes was of no use to him if he didn't know where they took his father, which was one thing that science could never explain. Only Ingo knew where he went and how, or perhaps he didn't. If he was anything like Looker, forgetting that Cynthia existed, let alone that they were ever engaged; it was entirely possible that Ingo didn't remember who he was or who he left behind.

The coffee table was swamped by piles and scraps of Illtyd's notes. At first, his family felt like they were being disrespectful by placing their cups on top of the notes, but they were background noise by then. Emmet placed the tea he made for his daughter on top of a drawing of an Ultra Wormhole.

'Bolt the door, please, Whimsicott.'

Syntyche's Whimsicott promptly obeyed. The doorbell rang minutes later. Winter and Audra had finally returned from Volkner's funeral. Audra stared at the floor and only quietly acknowledged her relatives, but Winter wore a frown that didn't exactly look like pure grief. She hesitated before hanging up her jacket beside Ingo's cap.

'Syn, you know that Volo...?'

'Oh... yes?'

'I've been thinking... that stuff Noah left to you... is it still up in the attic, Emmet?'

'Yup. Of course.'

Syntyche's gaze joined Audra's on the floor.

'I should auction it all off already... but... when does it become appropriate to sell a dead man's things...?'